EDITOR'S PICKS

• Test-Driving Homeownership

  When buyers–or their banks–aren't quite ready to commit, rent-to-own can be the answer.

• Negotiating Rent Gets Tougher

  Try these six strategies to cut your bill and hedge against future jumps.

THE LATEST

• May 14, 2013

  How to convert your home into a rental; You can probably shelter most of the rental income with tax deductions

  MarketWatch

  If your local real estate market is on the upswing, you might be thinking about becoming a landlord. You might even consider doubling down by renting out your current residence and buying another place to live in. If you convert your ...

• April 30, 2013

  More tax advantages of being a landlord; Commentary: Other things to consider before collecting rent

  MarketWatch

  With local real estate markets now improving in many areas (drastically in some cases), who can blame you for thinking about becoming a landlord? Plus there are some nice tax advantages of being a landlord, as I explained last week.

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  April 5, 2013

  Cheaper by the Dozen

  WSJ.com

  Investing in single-family homes is becoming increasingly popular—and now Wall Street has dreamed up a new way for investors to become landlords without worrying about 3 a.m. plumbing calls or late rent payments.

• March 5, 2013

  Pawning your portfolio; Wealthy investors are using their stocks and bonds to get large loans

  MarketWatch

  With loans still hard to come by, wealthy investors are embracing a somewhat surprising and potentially risky strategy: pawning their stocks and bonds.

• February 22, 2013

  Is it better to buy or rent a home? Crunching the numbers on the perennial real-estate question

  MarketWatch

  Despite the fact that home mortgage interest rates are near record lows, only 65.4% of Americans own homes, according the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2012 report. (See Homeownership Rates by State: 1984 to 2012) In fact, home ownership in the U.S. ...

• February 6, 2013

  How ending Saturday mail delivery will cost consumers; Move could increase late payments and devalue Netflix subscriptions

  MarketWatch

  If the Postal Service doesn’t deliver letters on Saturdays, mailboxes nationwide get a day off from being stuffed with junk mail. No big deal, right? But if you pay your bills by mail or subscribe to a DVD rental service, the change could ...

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  February 1, 2013

  Is That a Condo in Your IRA?

  WSJ.com

  Most investors use individual retirement accounts to buy stocks, bonds and mutual funds. Gordon Berger uses one to buy distressed homes and apartment buildings, which he fixes up and rents out.

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  January 25, 2013

  Housing Is Back—But Housing Stocks Are Due for a Fall

  WSJ.com

  Stock investors seem convinced that housing is headed for another boom. The shares of companies that build homes have rocketed in the past 18 months in anticipation of much better times.

• January 20, 2013

  Time to Buy a Home?

  WSJ.com

  Newlyweds Aaron and Tal Chaiken were planning to buy an apartment at some point. They were ready to stay in Chicago for at least five years, and hoped their good credit and income from Ms. Chaiken's new job as a lawyer could help them land ...

• December 16, 2012

  THE GAME PLAN; A Possible Very Early Retirement

  WSJ.com

  Ryan Lynch researched real-estate investing for nearly a decade before he and his wife, Amber, took the plunge and bought their first rental property last year. The couple, both 31, expect a growing real-estate portfolio to provide ...

• December 9, 2012

  Ask Next: Heading Off Gift Taxes; Joint property owners, 401(k) matches and deductions for medical expenses

  WSJ.com

  My son and I own a residential rental property together. I'm 82, and he is 52 and is to receive the property at the time of my death. We have owned it for about eight years. Can I gift my half directly to him now without either of us paying ...

• October 7, 2012

  Update Your Rental

  WSJ.com

  The microwave doesn't work well, the wallpaper is peeling and the bathroom needs a paint job. Welcome to life in a rental.Rental properties can be less than ideal for young professionals with a limited budget. Landlords are typically ...

• September 16, 2012

  Time to Repay Loans

  WSJ.com

  The postgraduation buzz wore off quickly once Curtis Smith realized he had to start paying off the $15,000 in student loans he took on to get his bachelor's degree.

• September 13, 2012

  It’s now cheaper to buy than rent: Trulia; Homeownership is the better deal in 100 biggest U.S. metro areas

  MarketWatch

  CHICAGO (MarketWatch) — It’s much cheaper to buy a home than rent one in 100 of the largest U.S. metropolitan areas, according to a report released on Thursday by the real-estate website Trulia.

• September 11, 2012

  A ‘Taxmageddon’ for real-estate investors; If you flip or own rental properties, you may have higher taxes in 2013

  MarketWatch

  The Bush tax cuts are set to expire at year-end. Plus, the new 3.8% Medicare surtax on investment income collected by higher-income individuals is scheduled to take effect next year. The combined tax-hiking impact of these two events has ...

• September 10, 2012

  the game plan; No Rent, No Mortgage

  WSJ.com

  You can do pretty well when you don't have rent to pay.Consider Chris Sturgis, 33, who has been living in his parents' Methuen, Mass., home since they moved to Japan four years ago. The only housing cost he is responsible for is about $400 ...

• September 10, 2012

  How to Make Safes Safer

  WSJ.com

  Most families accumulate valuables of some sort—jewelry, property deeds or even a precious family-photo collection. But few know how and where to safely store their treasures.

• June 25, 2012

  5 housing markets where renting beats owning

  MarketWatch

  In theory, plummeting home prices and record-low interest rates should make buying a home cheaper than renting one. But experts say in some parts of the country, it still pays to be a tenant.

• June 22, 2012

  The Tax Rules for Renting Out Your Vacation Home

  WSJ.com

  Summer is here, and so is this year's crop of summer rentals. In some areas, the market for vacation properties is even perking up after a string of down years.

• June 3, 2012

  I (Heart) Capitalism

  WSJ.com

  Some people are surprised to learn that I am a capitalist. When I am not writing columns criticizing capitalists for their misanthropic recklessness, I am thinking of ways to capitalize on others. One of the ways I do this is through a ...