trulia, zillow and St. Joseph

We've all heard about the great lengths that Realtors, builders and owners of homes for sale have been going to in order to snag a buyer in this slower real estate market. They've fixed-up the homes, reduced the price, put in new kitchens and baths, staged the homes and held countless open houses. And they've embraced the new internet based real estate models offered by Zillow, Trulia, craigslist, and Googlebase in an effort to get their property in front of buyers and make the sale. And we've heard about the free plasma TV's, granite counters, the new car in the garage, and the trips to Hawaii designed to entice buyers. But apparently there's another effort underway that has not gotten too much attention. Realtors and homeowners (I'm not sure about builders) "are turning to what could be described as religious faith, popular spirituality or just plain superstition. To help sell houses, agents and owners are buying statues of St. Joseph, and burying them upside down in the front yard. If you do that, the belief goes, and if you recite a prayer to the patron saint of carpenters and families, you will find a buyer for your home". From a story in The Arizona Daily Star, More Home sellers turn to St. Joseph More interesting yet, and I'm not sure how to take this, is that the Tucson Association of Realtors is selling these statues of St Joseph. "The Tucson Association of Realtors, which sells the statues for $5.75, has sold more than three times as many of the statues this year as last. In all of 2005, it sold 57 statues. In the first 11 months of this year, it sold 185".
I didn't know they sold them at all, the TAR hasn't done much to promote the availability of the statues. But then again if I were going to buy one, I don't think I'd buy it from The Tucson Association of Realtors, somehow that wouldn't seem like the right place to get it. But I don't have to worry about that because soon after moving into our first house in Tucson about six years ago, while I was digging around in the yard I dug up a statue of St Joseph, buried upside down. So I kept him, and when it came time to sell that house St Joseph went back in the ground, head first.