At least 20 hopeful buyers, an unusually large group even in New York's hot real estate market, submitted bids on Sept. 15.

A succession of hopeful buyers took the reins after Chapman's death.

This one would go out on a Guild heighliner to some hopeful buyer whose desert probably would be too moist.

An offer on a fourth was canceled because the hopeful buyer's company lost an important contract when Boeing pared production.

Without even advertising, the developer, AMCAL Multi-Housing Inc., has compiled a list of 2,000 hopeful buyers a year before the homes will be available.

After the lottery, the lines of hopeful buyers stretched around the block from the developer's office while frenzied property speculators scuttled back and forth offering wads of cash for places in line.

That Internet-era conundrum flummoxed many hopeful buyers of the new Nintendo Wii video game system over the weekend.

An agent willing to put that in writing, he said, will better protect a seller from an overly hopeful buyer who cannot qualify for a mortgage.

Although encouraged by the initial sales, Mr. Gropper said he had taken deposits on more than 10 other town houses from hopeful buyers who had been forced to withdraw because they could not sell their homes.

But at least they were well ahead of the exasperating game being played by thousands of hopeful buyers throughout the region, buyers competing in a stacked-against-them seller's market of tight inventory and correspondingly rising prices.