Huango Ideally you want the stop sign a block before your house. The way it works though, they hit the breaks just in the middle of my house (100 feet from corner) and I never hear it. Neither does my neighbor on the corner. Plus before this traffic was really wizzing by. What happened is my street is an offshoot of a really busy street and a cut through for the 100 houses who live on the surrounding blocks. So people were wizzing because we were the quiet part of a fork, not realizing that this is a quieter street. Now I think of the stop sign as a way for them to stop and think and when they start again it is usually slower. You can couple it with some children playing signs For us it would be the same school district (they actually go to religious school which will stay the same) either way and in a sense, if there is a pecking order, they will be further up because they live in the expensive neighborhood. However I may not be happy because most of my life I have been the one with more in the less expensive suburb. I think it would be weird for me to suddenly be the poor one. I did learn about a study in sociology class in college, I believe the study was done in the 1970s. People who made 40k and lived in a neighborhood where most made 20 or 30k I forget felt themselves richer (not necessarily happier) than people who made 40k and lived in a neighborhood where everyone made 60. They felt poor We will still provide music lessons, karate and ipods, all the trappings of suburban youth. I will often try to say to our kids that things are too expensive, whether they are or not. I think they really have no idea where we are financially. It is interesting because a friend is having some money troubles and in the same breath as she spent 2 hours on the phone to save on the ride to the airport (125), she got her 10 year old ds a Chocolate cell phone for his birthday (has an MP3 player and she spent 100 on it). We had a long discussion both about purchases (he actually did need a cell phone because she is sometimes stuck in traffic and he has to let himself in) and also although this would thrill him as the coolest cell phone in his class (at least 5 out of 17 kids have them), we did discuss that he may attach to much import to this thing. That it would have been ok to get this for Ben Smith in his class whose family owns a chain of stores because it would be just another thing. For her son we decided it would set him up to expect more and more which she and her DH could not provide right now. She ended up returning it for the RAZR which is less expensive and he was thrilled with that (so maybe hte message got lost anyway). However this digresses from the topic. I guess my point is that the top of the less expensive market is not that far from the bottom of the more expensive and it seems like you get so much more (less than .3 v more than .5 usually) "A house in a good location will nearly always hold its value. The one with an unchangeable negative to its location will always be hard to unload" Well said and I guess that is the issue. Since DH does not work in something requiring relocation I guess I should worry less about that. Still you never know what market you will be selling into. I do sort of regret not selling my house 3 years ago when everything was selling

I found this thread to vent... We live on a through street with two dead ends. I used to tell my kids to ride their bikes down to the dead ends since the through street which I live on is dangerous. The two ppl that live at the end of each dead end are nasty and have dogs they send out so my kids can't even go down there and turn around on their bikes. just because you live on the end of the street-you don't own it- I pay the same taxes for my non- dead end street- I don't shoo anyone away for using town property in from of my house. My kids should be able to ride their bikes there- as my street front is constantly bombarded with walkers/bikers/cars....

Eh... it is what it is, when you buy in a cul-de-sac subdivision. We had a cul-de-sac and we had great views... in the front.. if you did not mind looking down the road at the cars piled up in front of one house that worked on custom cars all day long... Or if you did not mind having police block the road once or twice a year due to someone having their rental raided. If you like the neighborhood and the house, pick your evils. Cul-de-sacs are hard to find, harder if you weed out the good vs bad neighborhoods, and the school districts that do not qualify. Me, I would wait and find something else, even if it is not a cul-de-sac... it would be too claustrophobic, but if you stay.. just make it your own.. make your view what you want, as others have said, and cover up the things with trees and such.. (I used Crape (or however you spell it) myrtles.. fast growing). I went in the back yard, with my coffee, and stood on the porch I built and everywhere I saw a window, I added a tree to block it. Took 14 trees, but when people walked back there, they were like, "wow!".. You can do that with the front, if you love everything else. Or, just walk ;) GL!

I don't know Okanagan, so it is difficult to name a plant, but what you need is a lawn height groundcover to eat up a lot of the space. A very short groundcover will allow the more typical suburban layout and spatial feel of a lawn without the lawn. Examples are the groundcover junipers - deer no like...unless - and cotoneaster that are woody shrubs. You could also look for something in a creeping flowering perennial or vine suitable to your climate. In your second picture with the tall grasses in bloom I see two low oval shrubs, right front, back left, and a shorter grass. Another option is simply plant a whole lot more of those in bigger drifts to fill the space. Hopefully that is their mature heights by habit. That idea can be used though, fill the space with a limited pallet of very low growing perennial plants organized to taste.