The Boston Globe recently reported that a lack of high speed Internet connections are keeping many rural homes from selling.

With more than 55% of the nation currently using broadband and many people, including myself, placing it up there with breathing on Maslow's hierarchy of needs, it's no wonder broadband is a deal breaker. Even though close to 90% of the nation is wired up for broadband, many rural homes still lack a decent Internet connection. And apparently many home buyers aren't willing to settle for a slower connection.

While real estate brokers have seen deals called off after potential buyers learned that there was no high speed connection, I've taken a more proactive approach. If my wife and I see a rural house we like, I'll call up the local cable office or go online to a DSL provider to see if the address is able to get a high speed connection. Just last week I saw a nice looking house on the edge of town, but before I could even share it with my wife I found out it was incapable of getting broadband from any provider which made sharing it unnecessary.

It seems that a fellow in Georgia had the desire to raise some quick cash, so he came up with a bright idea. He allegedly decided to auction six parcels of land. The auctions apparently went well, with the industrious man raking in $138,328. The problem is that the parcels he auctioned weren't his to sell. At least that's what is reported by The Buffalo News Police Blotter.

The man has been charged with one felony count of wire and mail fraud. The report says he used an unnamed website and fooled his would-be clients into believing the property was his to sell. The victims believed that they had made valid purchases, but deeds to the parcels never materialized. The good news is that between the FBI, the United States Postal Service and the City of Buffalo, this alleged crook has been nabbed.

If you've got cash money, now could be the time to, very selectively, put some of it into real estate.

I do a lot of editorial grunt work for the National Association of Realtors. One of the benefits is being privy to practically everything that anybody and everybody writes about the business.

Sure, real estate professionals aren't unbiased resources, and sometimes they're wrong. But they are right often enough that at least listening when they talk about real estate investment opportunities can pay off.

The Grand High Wizard of all things Best Places, Bert Sperling, has weighed in on which of the two cities, highlighted by the Fall Classic, his data says is the better place to live.

Sperling gives Philly the edge over Tampa by an 8-7 margin, mostly based on Philly's lower unemployment, cultural appeal, higher education and public transportation options. But Tampa keeps it close with better weather, cheaper housing and outdoor recreation.

We're not sure it should even be that close...when was the last time Philly got hit with a hurricane?

At the same time, Tampa does represent a great buying opportunity, as you can get a condo for less than $50,000 right near the rapidly growing University of Southern Florida campus. Compare that to the area around U-Penn or Haverford, and you'll see why Tampa might appeal to retirees and others looking to downsize.

For more information, check out the whole article, World Series of Cities: Tampa vs. Philly, at AOL Real Estate, or more best places to live.

The bailout that was railroaded through Congress contained precious little that was of direct help to anyone outside of Wall Street but, if you're interested in making your home greener and more energy efficient, there might be a little something there for you.

Realty Times reports that the bill included a 30% federal tax credit for the next eight years for new commercial and residential solar installations, along with a 10% tax credit for certain combined heat and power systems and for geothermal heat pumps. You can read about some of the other special go green tax credits here.

But don't get too excited: the investments required to make a home more technologically green-friendly are often prohibitively expensive. The tax credits help but for most home owners it's probably not practical. Many of the tax credits included in the bill are aimed at commercial property developers.

For tips on making your home more green on an affordable scale, check out HGTV's Green Home. You can even enter for a chance to win your own super high-tech energy efficient palace!

When we heard late last week that Coldwell Banker was announcing a 10-day "sale" to start last Friday, you can imagine our skepticism. Here we were looking at the worst week in stock market history, and buyers are supposed to rush out their local open house listings?

If you go to ColdwellBanker.com and you can see which listings in your area are participating in the 10-day sale. I just looked and there is one house in my ZIP code that reduced it's price by $50,000 (slightly less than 10%.)

I had a chance to talk with Jim Gillespie, President and CEO, Coldwell Banker Real Estate LLC, last week about the promotion.

Move over, mortgage payment. You're being nudged out of the headlines.

A new report from the Center for Housing Policy reports that almost every major expense associated with home ownership has shot up in the last ten years. (the study looks at the years between 1996 and 2006). The report, "Stretched Thin: The Impact of Rising Housing Expenses on America's Owners and Renters" lays out some sobering realities. But at least you know it's not just your imagination. (make sure to read the comments of this MarketWatch piece. Very interesting).

Not only has the average mortgage payment increased by 46% in those ten years, but property taxes increased 66%. Utilities shot up 43%. Property insurance spiked 83%!

Homeowner Incomes? Those went up by about 36% in those ten years, according to the survey (wonder if they collected that information from mortgage applications. "Liar Loans" were rife in the latter part of that decade).

Renters aren't excluded from this pain, either, as landlords tend to pass their increased costs onto their tenants. According to the report, rents rose by about 51% over the period examined, while renter incomes only rose 31%.

Apart from adding more gloomy news for your weekend, the report does make some recommendations. New housing needs to be far more energy efficient, and built closer to urban centers and public transportation.

For more details, see the entire report here.

Despite my Ivy League MBA and my role as a founder of a personal finance web site, I haven't done much in the way of planning my financial situation. All of my financial milestones in the past decade or so have been accidental, serendipitous, or just a gut response to a disaster.

I was pregnant pretty much the moment after I was engaged, at 28. Through the birth of three boys (all of which came along a little sooner than I expected), I worked in a unusual career that I made up out of whole cloth, starting out in dotcom operations management, finance and product development and ending as a professional blog producer. While it paid fairly well, it did not pay nearly as well as the jobs of my business school peers; and it became very difficult to make extra room in my budget to pay my huge student loan payments. Instead of paying down my student loans, I've only compounded them.

One thing I did brilliantly was to buy a house in an up-and-coming neighborhood immediately upon getting pregnant with my first child, and never refinancing it. Buying it was a gut reaction to the nesting hormones, but it turned out wonderfully. Four years later a Starbucks went in two blocks away, and my home's value doubled. Early on, I took out a home equity loan to (hiding my head in shame) pay for our wedding; I'm thankful I never refinanced the house, keeping my ARM that was garnered at the peak of my credit score. While I was seriously guilty of living outside of my means as a young bride and mama, after I became pregnant with my second son I buttoned down the hatches, canceling all my credit cards and vowing to live on what I made.

That one really good decision -- never to refinance my mortgage -- has paid off with a low-ish monthly payment and a fast-reducing principal balance. And with my new philosophy of "no debt no way never," I know at least I won't be facing a tough credit review at my local bank.

While the real estate market goes soft in many areas and more and more Americans become two mortgage families it's no surprise that some sellers are looking for gimmicks to get their home off the market. The New York Times reports that some homeowners are shifting their attention from one buyer to thousands as they raffle off their homes. One couple who recently raffled off their home $100 at a time sold over 6,500 tickets and raised $200,000 more than their home was worth, which was donated to a local charity.

In case you're wondering what motivated the couple above to give away $200,000 after trying to sell their house for so long, a look at the restrictions on gambling in your state should clear this up. In most states you cannot raffle off real estate or land without a nonprofit partner and in New York you can't raffle a house at all so keep that in mind before you run out and stock up on raffle tickets.

Some people are more optimistic than others. Ty Warner, the publicity shy mogul behind the Beanie Baby empire, has signed on for a penthouse apartment in Chicago...that hasn't even been built yet.

Warner has signed a contract to buy the 10,000, two-story penthouse in a proposed luxury building known at the Chicago Spire. The original asking price for the suite was $40 million, but Warner probably got a better deal, considering the real estate situation at the moment. Construction of the building has been halted due to the emaciated real estate market and attendant economic woes, but none of that seems to bother Warner.

I suppose when you've built a multi-million dollar empire on little stuffed toys, you've got reason to believe the glass is half full. Also, Warner, who is on Forbes 400 richest Americans list, with a net-worth of some $4.4 billion, holds a lot of real estate, which has tied him over well as the Beanie Baby craze has ebbed. According to Forbes, he owns the Four Seasons Hotel in New York City and the Montecito Country Club in Santa Barbara, California, among other extremely hi-hat properties. No word on what he actually did pay for his new apartment. But then this is a guy who doesn't need no stinking mortgage.

Warner locked in the penthouse suite on floors 141 and 142, which promises 360-degree views of the city when completed. But these vaunted views are a long way aways. Although the building will be the tallest residential building in the world, So far, the developer of the project, Shelbourne Development, only has the foundation completed.

Still, a man can dream. And if anyone has the wherewithal to do so these days, it's Ty Warner.

Don't you hate the first time you make a certain kind of purchase? We've all been in the situation when even the tidbits of advice you have heard over the years don't fully prepare you for the transaction.

The first time I felt this way about a deal was when I bought my first car. I made some goofy decisions and even though I did it half right I still felt like I could have gotten a better deal if I had been through the process before. As my wife and I are exploring home ownership I can't help but think that I am going to feel the same way about our home purchase.

Yesterday I found a great resource which really raised my hopes for taking out a mortgage and buying a home without remorse. The aptly titled article, "How to Get a Mortgage" on Mahalo.com breaks down the process of getting a mortgage into bite size morsels of knowledge so detailed and applicable it should be printed in pamphlets and handed out in front of every bank!

Our friends at Forbes have put out their annual list of the "Best cities for singles." San Francisco was the top city last year, but Atlanta crowded it out because of lower cost of living and job growth.

While job growth and living above the poverty level are certainly nice when you are a young single-something, in reality you are mainly looking for other singles to make yourself less single (or something.)

The rest of the top five include a bizarre tie between Dallas and Minnesota (maybe depending on your political affiliation you prefer one to the other.) and our nation's capitol, Washington, D.C.

I always find it interesting to see which occupations and markets survive and prosper when the economy gets tough. My interest is likely linked to my fascination with the way certain creatures adapt to weather changes in climates and environments. Along those lines, I was fascinated when MSNBC ran an interesting story about "board up" men, a group of contractors who specialize in taking care of foreclosed properties.

Many of the individuals making the transition from high-end kitchen and bath installers to board up men are still making good money, pulling in between $1,500 and $5,000 per job and working 5-10 jobs a week. Banks who don't keep their properties in good condition face fines from local communities as part of an effort to shore up neighboring home prices and keep out squatters. The costs associated with keeping a foreclosure from becoming a public nuisance are high enough that it might be money better spent on providing potential buyers with more detailed information on the quality of a foreclosed property in order to move the home quicker.

I'm surprised at how quickly this need was filled by resourceful contractors. Then again, I guess the construction business has been a little slow lately. With an estimated 35% of real estate listings made up of foreclosures and bank-owned homes, I'm about ready to quit my day job and pick up a new career involving wood, screws and plywood. Well, that or I could use my last week of vacation boarding up a few local properties!

Neal Templin's Cheapskate column in today's Wall Street Journal (subscription required), is a reminder that restlessness -- and the cost of relocation -- doesn't come cheap.

Templin and his wife are making their fifth move in 17 years. In their situation, it's work related. Still, even with the fringes of a corporate relocation, the costs add up. "You spend thousands fixing up the home you sell and thousands more fixing up the home you buy," and that doesn't include the costs -- both in time and money -- that most of us don't consider. Things like transferring automobile registration and insurance, finding new resources, or enrolling in new schools may demand more time and stress than money, but it all counts.

In "The Millionaire Next Door," 1998, Stanley and Danko described research they had done into the characteristics of millionaires. It turned out that millionaires often don't look like millionaires. They don't necessarily drive a Mercedes or even a relatively new car. More interesting, millionaires tend to stay put. They stay married and they don't move all that often. They tend to keep what they acquire. They also don't spend much time on home projects. They don't fritter their energy away, the use it to make more money.

We may be beginning to emerge from decades of bigger is better and more still isn't enough. Maybe we'll become less restless.

When it comes to borrowing money, credit unions are my favorite place to go because of the quality personal service I receive. In the current credit industry, where the 10th bank this year recently closed, credit unions are faring well and even bragging about it.

BankRate.com looked into how credit unions are prospering while conventional banks are taking hits across the board. It found that the success was linked to credit unions being quicker to share best practices even with those in the same market, and due to the fact that the credit unions faced lower write-offs and delinquencies than traditional banks.

Not only are credit unions doing well in avoiding write-offs, but many of them are boasting increased membership. Further adding to the health of credit unions in a tumultuous environment is that for the first quarter of 2008, as a whole, they issued more loans than they have historically. Analysts place this rise on the willingness of credit unions to utilize their local knowledge and sit down with individuals in order to provide smart lending.

This throwback to the old-fashioned, highly human-involved method of banking may be one part of what protected the credit unions from the current fallout, not to mention a good way for individuals to continue to get loans to get the economy back on track, at least on a small scale.