This particular house has vacant lots on each side of it. This is not at all unusual in that town. Lots of homes, especially those on the edges of town, have vacant lots. When I lived there, I had neighbors on each side of me, but across the street were 5 wide open lots, as well as directly behind me and opening up to the desert to the north. These lots are often full of brush, dead tumble weeds, etc. The wind blows all kinds of random stuff around. The wind out there is pretty strong. One year we had an entire door blown in to the backyard, never found out who it belonged to. heh.
Now that all said, last night (I hope it's okay to mention this) I had to go to CalCity to drop things off for a family member, right near this location. I quickly drove by and saw.... absolutely nothing. There was no crime scene tape, no cars, anything. The house looked dark ( is was just after sunset) except for a couple of exterior lights that were on. The only thing visible were what we've seen in photos, the pile of balloons and candles that have appeared on the southeast corner of the property by a fence/tree. It looked like any other home in the neighborhood on a cold December evening. Absolutely nobody was out there and no indication it was a "crime scene" as some people have claimed. So, whatever may have been there has long since been removed. Keep in mind I didn't go there on purpose to search this out. I was in the immediate area anyway and since this is such a remote community, and I know many people living here...
I will say that the lot to the east of the house has some dead trees/shrubbery on it and there are two trees in the front yard. So it certainly plausible the father was looking for wood or material to burn. There's certainly plenty of combustible material in the lots surrounding the home, especially the east side.