by Tanta on 4/24/2007 08:40:00 AM

Maybe this strikes me as profoundly surreal just because it's early in the day. You be the judge.

From Marketwatch's "Protecting your value as foreclosures rise: Tips to buffer your home's worth if you're near an empty property":

Although Moody's Economy.com sees home prices overall declining through 2008 due to excessive inventory, individual owners can take steps to make their property more attractive, Chen said. She recommended home improvements such as fresh paint and landscaping to ward off the impacts of falling prices due to a great number of foreclosures in a neighborhood.

If you've already got vinyl siding and all the rhododendrons you can stand, I suggest lawn ornaments. The Virgin in a bathtub comes to mind, along with that buried statue of St. Joseph. Never underestimate the power of the intercession of saints, especially when the "control group" is a bucket of paint and a couple of shrubs.

For those homeowners fearing that the "low-ballers" and banks trying to unload foreclosed homes will sap the value of their own properties, Kent suggested that residents could band together to watch out for a property.

"They could try forming a little neighborhood watch where people watch over that house to make sure there's no vandalism, no squatters trying to move in, and to avoid people from stealing the fixtures of the home," he said.

Personally, I think the better strategy is just to get every irritated blue-hair in the neighborhood to call the mortgage servicer two or three times a day to report excess dandelions. If the saints don't come through for you, there's always the power of getting on someone else's nerves.

Homeowners who have to sell in an area where foreclosures are numerous might want to follow the lead of home builders, which are throwing in extras in to attract buyers while keeping up the selling price.

"One thing that the builders do is to offer to put all kinds of things into the house at no extra charge, like granite countertops," said David Seiders, chief economist for the National Association of Home Builders. "That gives the buyer more house for the money."

Also, paying your buyer's closing costs is an option that some home builders take, Seiders said. Those strategies "help hold the price up, but they do come out of the builder's margins," he said, as they would cut into home sellers profits.

Well, now, there's an idea. Do as the builders do: protect your value by cutting your price while pretending that you aren't cutting your price. Let every potential buyer know that you are not including your countertops in the sales price--they are free to a good home. Heck, anyone who falls for this might also take that litter of kittens under the porch.

It's important to think of homeownership as a long-term investment, said David Berenbaum, executive vice president with the National Community Reinvestment Coalition. "People have been in an environment where they're flipping homes. We need to look at homeownership as promoting intergenerational wealth."

Berenbaum added that owners should remain calm rather than panicking and trying to sell now. Owners don't actually lose money on a home until they sell at a discount to the purchase price, he pointed out.

That's the final of four tips: don't sell, bequeath. There's nothing like that "intergenerational wealth" to protect home values.

In tomorrow's episode, maybe we'll get tips for how to buy properties in a foreclosed neighborhood, wherein we will learn the true value of paint, shubs, roving gangs of homeowners, free countertops, and sellers who would rather die than cut the price.