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Perhaps in the back of my mind I realize that it's going to start getting cold in Chicago, or perhaps  it's all of the real estate gloom and doom that the media is focusing on with horror stories of all the foreclosures in cities such as Las Vegas. 

Whatever the reason, I've been looking more and more at the Las Vegas real estate market.

It really was no secret for anybody that understands the very nature of supply and demand that real estate speculators caused the artificial appreciation rates that Las Vegas saw in 2004 with 52% appreciation rates. The fall out this year has not been very pretty and the media certainly is not helping out but as seen from the article above, the media also helped fuel the very problem of real estate speculation to begin…

Ok -- just joking but it is kind of funny to think that the Chicago Cubs could actually win the World Series. Yes... I am a realist and I fully understand they are in a race to win the worst division in baseball.

Long ago when the baseball season started and the Cubs were off to a stellar start and something like 2 and 10, I posted something about the Cubs being officially up for sale by the very owners -- the Chicago Tribune.  When I originally posted about this and contemplated a value, the very owner of the creator of this blog stated he was offering $50 bucks for the Cubs! You can read his comment here ---> Chicago Cubs Officially Up for Sale...

I've always been a big fan of baseball and I think that historical teams such as the Chicago Cubs bring…

Can anybody confirm this? I've been extremely busy with some things and I jumped on Active Rain to post a quick blog and noticed all kinds of advertising including a HomesbyOwner.com banner directly to the right of the very blog that I was posting.

Are they seriously taking the chance of corrupting their system and becoming another R.com?

I was actually posting an article over on Active Rain and looking for a used car salesman picture and came across this video. I particularly like how this guy keeps selling even after getting crushed!  Enjoy! 

Top Gun Motors - Watch more free videos

It was bound to start and we predicted that it would happen well over a year ago. New Home builders in Chicago that would start offering great incentives for potential buyers to purchase their homes. Through years of experience working with new home sales there are several things we have learned and some of these are:

New Home Builders Are in the business to sell Homes

New home builders typically do not sit around on standing inventory and price their homes to see what will happen. They price their homes to sell and offer incentives so they can pay off their construction loans which are at a higher interest rate then your typical standard mortgage.

New Home Builders Don't get their advice from the Media or their Neighbors

They hire professionals to…

It was during our daily evening ritual of spending time with our daughter and visiting Lagendorf park that we met a super nice couple who had a daughter similar in age to ours. They had relocated from the City of Chicago to Barrington for pretty much the same reasons we did and had purchased a vintage home in the historical district of Barrington.

We mentioned that a historical home that came up for sale in Barrington had originally attracted our attention to Barrington when we were looking to relocate to the North Shore of Chicago. It was a really great conversation about restoring vintage homes and some of the great architecture you can find in Barrington including the preservation districts restoration guidelines.

As the sun began to set and the park…

I'm watching Bill O'Reilly on Fox and the headline comes flashing across the bottom of the screen - Barry Bonds breaks Home run record with #756!

I don't even flick the channel over to ESPN or even bother to jump on line to check out the details. In fact, I don't even know where he hit it and I'm not even interested for something that was such a monumental achievement.

Automatically the assumption readers will have with my above statement is that I am not a baseball fan or I don't like Barry Bonds.

Quite the opposite -- I grew up loving baseball and lived and breathed it. I have boxes and boxes of baseball cards from when I was growing up and probably have several of Barry's rookie cards but I'm not even going to look. For some reason, I lost complete…

In my blog concerning "The Next Great Real Estate Investment" posted on May 5th I highlight the benefit of investing in cheap farm land surrounding Chicago with some highlights of how much land has gone up in Iowa in the past year. (While so called Real Estate Investors are realizing that $500,000 investment real estate speculating in new homes in Las Vegas, Arizona or Florida is not such a great investment after all.. I even highlighted the alternative $650,000 paid for a one bedroom condo in Las Vegas compared to what that could buy you in farm land.)

I would love to say I have some power followers for my real estate advice and take credit for the creation of this research by Crains Business Chicago in their article concerning Bill Gates buying up…