Ever since Ugg married Meg and they purchased their first cave, there have been co-signers.

Back in the day, it was probably Pop Brutus and Mom Brunhilda who helped the kids qualify for their first place. Nowadays, it’s usually still Mom and/or Dad who join the youngsters on their first mortgage.

But it can be anyone, actually: another relative, friend, employer, roommate, significant other or even an investor, any of whom can agree to be on a mortgage that the first-timers couldn’t qualify for on their own.

Nationwide, 22 percent of houses purchased with financing in the first quarter of this year involved co-borrowers, according to ATTOM Data Solutions. That’s up from 20 percent for the same period last year. The rate of co-borrowing is even higher in 11 of the country’s largest cities. In Miami, the rate was 40 percent; in Seattle, 37 percent; in San Diego and Los Angeles, 28 percent.

The main reason homebuyers need co-borrowers is because they can’t qualify to purchase the house they want, says ATTOM executive Daren Blomquist, who co-signed for his wife’s sister and her husband so they could afford to buy in pricey Southern California.

The reason many first-time buyers can’t qualify is partly because houses are so costly. Housing prices are so high in some places that if younger folks don’t have help, they might be relegated to the rental market forever.

But even if prices are reasonable, some buyers don’t have the credit scores, credit histories or the debt-to-income ratios to buy. And many buyers are simply looking at houses beyond their means.

The situation is so dire, says Blomquist, some companies are offering to help young buyers in exchange for a piece of the action in the form of shared appreciation. Outfits such as unison.com and gocobuy.com are “institutionalizing the idea of co-borrowing and shared equity,” he says.

All of this begs the question: How should you approach a co-borrowing situation, both as a buyer and as a co-signer?

Actually, the most important part isn’t getting into it; it’s getting out of it. While clear heads still prevail -- that is, while both sides are excited about the deal and there have been no disagreements yet -- you should sit down together and decide how and when the deal will end.

How long will it last? Long enough, certainly, for the buyer to build up his credit, income and cash reserves so he can eventually buy out the co-signer. But what if interest rates are so high at that time that it would be unwise for the buyer to seek a new loan? In that regard, the deal might include some kind of buffer, either a period or time or a certain mortgage rate.

Of course, the main thing to decide is what share of the profits the co-borrower will be entitled to, if there are, indeed, any profits to split. A relative may not want anything in return -- thanks, Mom and Dad -- but someone else might want a healthy chunk. Say, 50 percent.

But how do you determine profit? It’s easy if the buyer agrees to sell and move on. But if there is no sale, you’ll need to know what the place is worth at the time the deal is to be dissolved.

Here, an appraisal, the cost of which should be borne equally, is in order. But if one side or the other disagrees with the valuation, it might be a good idea for each party to pay for their own appraisal. And if there is any difference between the two, you might agree now to split the difference down the middle.

What about losses? If the value of the property goes down, will the co-signer share in the loss, and to what extent? By the same percentage as he would had there been a gain?

Another aspect of the deal that people tend to forget: improvements made to the property during the co-ownership period. Usually, the buyer foots the bill for things such as landscaping and any additions. But will he have to share in the value of these and other features that add to the home’s worth?

Co-borrowers need to realize that while they are a co-signer on the mortgage, they are not on the title and have no ownership interest in the place. Yet, their own debt-to-income ratio could take a hit because they have incurred debt by co-signing. Consequently, their ability to obtain their own mortgage, home equity loan or even a credit card could be limited.

Remember, too, that if your buyer doesn’t make the house payments as promised, the lender will come to you for redress. You will be responsible not just for the payments but also late fees -- and, if it comes to that, collection fees and lawyer’s fees. And of course, late payments are likely to take a heavy toll, as is your personal relationship with the buyer.

To protect themselves, co-borrowers should insist that both they and the buyer be billed separately by the mortgage company so you will know within 30 days or so if your partner is tardy. That way, you will be able to address the issue before it gets out of hand.

New homebuyers who search builder websites are likely to be in for a big surprise when they visit model homes.

According to research from HomesUSA.com, the prices would-be buyers find at the job site are often higher than they are on the website, or on the builder’s post in the multiple listing service. In one case, says HomesUSA President Ben Caballero, the difference was a striking $100,000.

The Addison, Texas-based company found no rhyme or reason to the discrepancies. In most instances, job site prices were higher than those listed online and on the MLS. In some cases, though, it was the other way around.

Either way, in the four major Texas markets the brokerage firm studied -- Dallas, Houston, Austin and San Antonio -- there were price deviations in a third of the cases.

The differences smack of bait-and-switch schemes designed to lure buyers into visiting a builder’s community in person instead of just online. And in some instances -- “a small minority” -- that may be the case, says Caballero.

More likely, though, “it’s an honest mistake,” he says, because one part of a builder’s operation doesn’t know what the other part is doing. And many builders don’t have procedures in place to ensure that price changes put into effect at the job site are also updated on the web or the MLS.

Sometimes builders forget to tell their real estate agent, who manages their MLS listings, about price changes. And sometimes they fail to notify the in-house person who manages the website. But either way, the oversight can be terribly misleading.

HomesUSA found price discrepancies averaging $17,000 in a third of the houses advertised for sale by one merchant builder alone.

The research is limited to Texas, which is the largest new-home market in the country. But Caballero suggests there is no reason to believe the same thing isn’t going on everywhere.

“To me, builders are playing with fire,” he says. “They are leaving themselves open for complaints and mistrust. This is not a small deal.”

As Caballero sees it, the problem is not about builders’ inability to manage prices. It’s their inability to manage information. “Zillow and others have been criticized for bad data. This is just another case where consumers are getting bad data,” he says.

And boy, is the data bad. One major Houston builder had price discrepancies on 70 percent on his houses, HomesUSA found. Another large builder who was active in 23 markets across the state thought he had things under control, but “was absolutely flabbergasted” when Caballero showed him that he didn’t.

“It’s not for lack of effort,” the broker says. “It’s usually for lack of ability.”

It’s not just prices that builders’ websites and MLS listings aren’t keeping up with, either. It’s also the sales status of their houses: whether a house is completed or still under construction, or whether a house is sold or still available.

“Whether a house is move-in ready makes a big difference to someone who wants to move in right away,” explains Caballero.

HomesUSA manages its builder feeds electronically. “It can’t be done manually,” which is what many builders try to do. “There are too many moving parts,” Caballero says. “Builders have been slow to adopt technology; that’s not their core competency,” he says. And as result, when sales managers are notified of a price change, management forgets -- or fails -- to notify the person who manages the website. Consequently, the information drops through the cracks.

So what can buyers do when they are led to believe one thing by a builder’s website or MLS post, only to find out prices are higher when they visit the model home park?

If you are convinced the discrepancy is deliberate, you can complain to your local Better Business Bureau or the consumer affairs agency in your area, or perhaps your state’s attorney general’s office.

But if you believe it’s an honest error, you might try to leverage your buying power by negotiating, either for a price somewhere between the two numbers or for a free option or upgrade. To maintain goodwill, some builders will try to work with their customers -- especially when the builders were wrong to begin with.

The farm-to-table movement, first popularized by restaurants and grocery stores wishing to showcase the freshness of their local ingredients and produce, is slowly gaining credence in residential real estate.

The trend is taking hold largely in the apartment market, where residents share in the bounty of a large garden plot that produces fruits and vegetables at no charge. In Northridge, California, for example, the Terrena complex features a produce garden just outside the leasing office, leaving a strong impression on would-be tenants.

But farming is also taking place on a smaller scale at individual houses -- often called farmscaping. In Culver City, California, one house has a front garden that, a decade ago, “would have risked censure from the city and neighbors,” says Dan Allen of Farmscape Gardens. The company built that yard’s gardens, and is the largest urban-farming venture in the Golden State.

Now, farmscaping is “a point of pride as water-wise landscaping is incentivized rather than rebuked,” Allen adds, “and bountiful harvests are shared with friends, family, colleagues and neighbors.”

The Farmscape CEO estimates that the 275 sites his company built and maintains on a weekly basis generate some 200,000 pounds of produce annually. And that does not count the 300-plus other sites it designed that are managed by others.

Most of the firm’s real estate-related gardens to date have been at commercial properties, such as the San Francisco 49ers’ Levi’s Stadium. The stadium’s rooftop farm provides fresh produce for facility staff and on-site restaurants on a daily basis.

But some developers are creating entire “agrihoods” -- neighborhoods built around a farm rather than a golf course. The concept isn’t new, says Allen, but it’s “starting to catch fire now with organic farms serving as the focal point.”

Last year, Farmscape did small raised-bed gardens at apartment properties owned by Prometheus, a leading multifamily company on the West Coast. It also did a quarter-acre garden consisting of an orchard and raised beds at Veterans Village near San Francisco, which occupants will maintain on their own.

Though the Oakland-based company is decidedly a California outfit, it is starting to break out to other parts of the country, consulting on projects in Nevada and Texas.

The company has competition, but the others “don’t do all we do,” says Lara Hermanson, another Farmscape principal. “We design and consult and help with entitlements. Then we construct, maintain and propagate.”

Working with developers and their architects from the conceptual stage, the company can integrate orchard trees, food beds and, space and climate permitting, even vineyards. It even attends zoning hearings to garner community support for a sometimes unwanted development, and, in cases where it is not hired to manage the gardens, it works with residents and volunteer gardeners to make sure the agrihood thrives.

Residents aren’t always looking to become full-time farmers, so only a handful of communities take on the work of tending to their edible landscaping, Hermanson says. “In most cases, I’m the farmer in perpetuity.”

Typically, a small community-wide garden would consist of eight to 10 raised beds, a half-dozen orchard trees and some mulching, Hermanson says. Larger gardens would include more sizable orchards, row crops and ornamental plantings.

Gardens like these don’t come cheaply. A few raised vegetable and fruit beds and some hardscaping in just a quarter of a typical backyard can run up to $5,000. For the “whole shebang,” says Hermanson, a homeowner might spend upwards of $30,000 for a 2,500-square-foot garden. And some estimate that homeowners have spent close to $100,000 on their gardens.

A big planned unit development might also go to $100k or more for a 5- to 7-acre mini-farm. But according to Hermanson, “that’s in line with normal landscaping costs -- and often cheaper.”

Developers, especially those doing small sites, will often feature their gardens as the main amenity. And some larger builders are putting in “farmettes” in place of far more expensive golf courses and swimming pool complexes.

Developers are finding that “golf courses are not getting used,” says Hermanson. “Not everybody plays, but everybody eats.”

Edward McMahon, a Senior Fellow for Sustainable Development at the Urban Land Institute (ULI), says food is “providing a growing arena for innovation in real estate.”

“Growing, processing and selling food ... can pay big dividends for savvy developers as well as for consumers, communities and the environment,” says McMahon, who led a session on the topic at ULI’s fall meeting last year.

Of course, homeowners pay for the gardens as part of the homeowner’s association fees, just like they do for their pool complexes, golf courses and other amenities. Farmscape charges $700 to $1,500 a month to maintain a small garden, and $12,000 to $15,000 monthly to manage a high-end garden with a 200-tree orchard.

But there are payoffs. While a decently landscaped lot can boost a property’s value by 6 percent to 7 percent, according to a National Association of Realtors report, edible landscaping can pump up values by 28 percent. Also, well-designed gardens not only filter air pollutants, they can help cool homes during the summer and serve as wind blocks in the winter.