Is the good old-fashioned open house still a powerful marketing tool, or is it now pointless in this age of electronic media?

It's a question that's debated often among real estate agents. Some love open houses, some hate them. But many still use them, if not to snag a buyer, then at least to hook new clients.

According to a recent poll by the trade magazine Real Estate, agents are almost evenly divided about open houses, with 44 percent in favor and 56 percent against. At the same time, though, 62 percent -- almost two-thirds -- host one to three open houses every month. Only 24 percent won't sit in a house on a Saturday or Sunday, waiting and hoping for a buyer.

If you are going to hold an open house, you should make sure your agent doesn't simply stick a sign in the front yard and hope prospects show up. Rather, he or she should make it an event, like the folks at Chicago's Kuehl Group brokerage do.

"We take open houses seriously and consider them an important initiative in our marketing strategy," broker-owner MaryEllen Kuehl posted on the ActiveRain real estate site recently.

Some sellers don't like open houses. After all, selling a house is stressful enough without adding a weekend or two where they have to leave for several hours, kids and pets in tow, allowing anyone and everyone to walk through their pristine palaces.

But Kuehl said in an interview that once she lays out her plan, most of her clients agree to give it a shot. "They understand they need to do some work, too," she said. "They realize the benefit. The more qualified people who see their house, the more quickly it will sell."

To stage an open house, Kuehl says preparation is key, and that it should start months in advance. Here are some of the steps her agents take to make open houses a success.

-- In selecting the day and time for your open house, your agent should do some research into what's going on in your area to minimize conflicts and optimize attendance. If there's a big ball game on Saturday or Sunday, for example, skip that weekend and pick one where there's relatively little going on.

-- Advertising is key. The Kuehl Group sends postcards to the neighbors, because often a neighbor will know someone who is in the market for a place close to theirs. For example, a nurse I know just sold her house to her next-door neighbor's father without having to do any marketing.

Kuehl Group agents also send email announcements to every agent and broker in the Chicago area, as well as to her own agents' private mailing lists. The client's sphere of influence is also notified via social media, and the event is publicized on specialized open house websites.

-- "The online marketing should be complete and flawless," says Kuehl. Social media is important, she says, since "most visitors will check out a house online" before dropping by.

Toward that end, she hires a professional photographer to take pictures, which she then puts on a custom site for each seller's home. These individualized sites feature virtual tours and the day and time of the open house. The company goes so far as buying targeted ads on Facebook to run the 24 hours prior to the event.

-- Next, Kuehl agents help their clients with staging the property so it shows as well as possible. They make suggestions on arranging furniture, presenting each room's highlights, removing personal items and setting up lighting.

-- On the day of the open house, directional signs are placed at every point of entry into the neighborhood. The sign placed in front of the house is adorned somehow, often with balloons or flags. If the weather is inclement, a sign at the front door asks visitors to remove their shoes, with "footies" provided to cover stocking feet.

To keep the home fresh in visitors' minds, Kuehl agents also offer custom water bottles with pictures of the house on the label.

-- For a good first impression, sellers are asked to mow their lawns just prior to the event. It also is suggested that they freshen flowerbeds and put down a new doormat.

-- Just before the anointed hour, agents put some cookies in the oven or boil lemons on the stove. Plan B: scented candles. "The wafting smells are so inviting," Kuehl says.

Her agents disdain putting out food, though. "Sellers work too hard to keep their places clean to have crumbs all over the place," Kuehl explains. Food is only for open houses held for local brokers agents, and even then, she doesn't think it's really necessary: "Some just come for the food."

As you can see, it's not easy to pull off a top-notch open house. But it could be well worth the trouble if the house sells quickly, and for top dollar.

Always, the Chicagoland broker advises, the goal should be "to make sure homes show like a shiny new dime and bring in the best possible pool of prospective buyers. We know buyers are picturing themselves living in the house as they tour, and we do everything in our power to make it easy for them."

Consumers looking for coastal real estate quickly learn the difference between an "ocean peek" unit and an "ocean view." A "peek" apartment is on the lower floors and offers only an obstructed view of the water, so it is less valuable. But the peek can sometimes become a view, and the unit's value may not be enhanced at all. In fact, quite the contrary.

What we're talking about, of course, is what can happen if your property is unlucky enough to take a hit from Mother Nature in the form of a hurricane. The results can be pretty devastating.

Take the case of a mid-Florida building about 50 yards from the Atlantic Ocean, where a friend (who asked to remain nameless) owns an apartment. When struck full-on by two hurricanes a few weeks apart in 2004 -- Frances and then Jeanne -- his unit and others were heavily damaged and the building's lobby became a swimming pool.

While you may believe the chances of a hurricane, tornado or other natural disaster are slim, their effects are being felt in the government's National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP). Even the general rise in sea level is having an impact.

The insurance pool, if you will pardon the pun, is already underwater -- and projected to become even more so.

In fact, if you don't have flood insurance, or not enough to satisfy the NFIP requirements, Uncle Sam allows lenders to place expensive flood insurance on properties on which they hold the mortgage. And guess what? Lenders don't pay the premiums; you do -- and the rates are often much higher than if you purchased coverage yourself.

The New York State Department of Financial Services has a short and sweet explanation of the process:

"Force-placed insurance, also known as creditor-placed, lender-placed or collateral protection insurance, is an insurance policy placed by a lender, bank or loan servicer on a home when the property owners' own insurance is canceled, has lapsed or is deemed insufficient and the borrower does not secure a replacement policy. This insurance allows the lender to protect its financial interest in the property."

New York regulators have some direct experience with the problem of rapidly rising sea levels. One of the buildings where it has offices along the riverfront in Manhattan's Battery Park was extensively flooded by Hurricane Sandy.

But as it turns out, rising water in the Battery Park area has been tracked for a long time. In the last century, the level of the water there has risen nearly 12 inches, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. While that doesn't sound like much, an extra foot of water flooding your property adds geometrically to a storm's destruction.

Flood damage, which can run into the tens of the thousands of dollars, isn't always caused by storms. Sometimes the cause is a broken pipe, or a major rain storm. And who pays for the necessary repairs depends on whether or not you have flood coverage, which isn't included in your homeowner's policy.

With the passage of the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act in 2012, Congress decided that the federal flood insurance program should be actuarially sound, meaning the premiums collected should be enough to pay for the insurance claims the program paid out.

The NFIP's current deficit has been estimated at anywhere between $24 billion and $28 billion. And that's only going to increase. But shortly after the Biggert bill went into effect, consumers began to squawk when their premiums rose, some to as much as $28,000 a year, according to the National Association of Realtors.

When the screaming became loud enough, the mortgage and real estate businesses lobbied successfully to obtain relief from big jumps in premiums. And just two years after lawmakers passed Biggert, they backtracked a bit by passing the Homeowner Flood Insurance Affordability Act, which set limits on how much premiums could increase in any one year.

Now, premium increases are limited to 25 percent annually until the full actuarial rate is reached. People who buy existing homes or condos fall under the same formula. But buyers of brand-new units in flood-prone areas must pay the full cost from the get-go.

Even then, the flood insurance program may never be self-sustaining.

A study commissioned by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has some pretty stark projections on the increase in the number of flood insurance policies and the cost of claims in this century. It attributes 30 percent of the increases to added population and 70 percent to climate change.

"Under the assumption of a fixed shoreline, the total number of NFIP policies may increase by approximately 100 percent by the year 2100, with the number of riverine policies increasing by about 80 percent and the number of coastal policies increasing by as much as 130 percent," the FEMA study said. "The greater number of coastal policies is the result of the enlargement of the SFHA (Special Flood Hazard Area) caused by sea level rise."

In addition, according to the report, the average loss cost per policy could increase 50 percent and the average premium rise by 40 percent.

Information on the NFIP is available at FloodSmart.gov.

(Freelance writer Mark Fogarty contributed to this report.)

Heads up for homeowners who are trying to obtain a loan modification: You better be careful out there.

Ditto for anyone whose loan has been sold or transferred from one lender to another.

These are the most complained-about issues that consumers have with their mortgages, according to the latest tabulation of consumer complaints by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB).

These types of issues pop up again and again, according to the CFPB. In fact, since the agency started accepting complaints in 2011, it has received more mortgage-related gripes than any other kind of financial products -- close to 200,000 of them. Here are some of the most common issues, and tips on how to handle them.

THE PROBLEM: Payment confusion. More than a third of the beefs have to do with just trying to make a payment, which should be a rudimentary task: Stick a check in the envelope the lender sent you, put a stamp on it and put it in the mail. Or, make the payment online. What can be so hard about that?

But the problem isn't on the sender's end; it's on the recipient's. And that's especially true if your lender -- or company that services your loan on behalf of your lender -- transfers your account to another entity. That's when it gets complicated, as many borrowers have found.

According to the CFPB, consumers report "confusion and frustration" about where to make their payments when their loans change hands. They maintain that they do not feel properly informed about the switch. And they complain that their payments often increase unexpectedly.

WHAT TO DO: You should receive a "goodbye" letter from your original lender and a "hello" letter from the new one. If you have any questions whatsoever, get on the horn with the first lender to make sure your loan has indeed been sold.

When you write your first check to the new lender/servicer, make sure you put both account numbers -- the old and new ones -- on the check, and make sure you put down which number belongs to which lender.

About the amount changing without notice: Frequently when a loan changes hands, the new servicer will re-calculate your escrow accounts, and your payment will float up or down according to the new calculation. But again, if you have any questions, call.

THE PROBLEM: Misapplied payments. According to the CFPB, many homeowners say that despite their explicit instructions, their payments are not properly applied. And they grouse that partial payments were sent back to them.

WHAT TO DO: Lenders won't accept partial payments; they say their software programs are not set up that way. So if you can only send part of what you owe in a particular month, call the company and tell them what's up.

The same goes if you feel the need to send the lender special instructions, say, to apply an additional amount to your principal. Call and ask how you should go about this, then call again a week or two after you send the payment to make sure your wishes were carried out.

THE PROBLEM: Loan-mod gridlock. According to the CFPB, financially strapped consumers continue to have big problems when they try to work with their lenders to prevent going into foreclosure. They complain of long delays and a lack of information when applying for a loan modification. And they say that servicers move forward with foreclosure proceedings while their application for a loan mod is under review -- a tactic known as dual-tracking.

WHAT TO DO: This is a tough one, but probably the best advice is to work through an independent housing counselor who knows the ropes better than you. You can find a list of government-approved counselors at www.hud.gov.

As far as dual-tracking is concerned, realize that the servicer is concerned with one thing and one thing only: collecting your money. The lender, on the other hand, would very much like to save the loan. Unfortunately, the two entities, or perhaps the two departments, don't talk to each other.

But under the rules put in place by the CFPB nearly three years ago, servicers are not supposed to start a foreclosure proceeding if a borrower has already submitted a complete application for a loan modification or other alternative to foreclosure, and that application is still pending review. So make sure your application is complete.

Also, to give borrowers reasonable time to submit such applications, servicers cannot make the first notice or filing required for the foreclosure process until you are more than 120 days late. And remember, foreclosure is not just an event; it's a process. How long a process depends on the rules in your state.