A nice way to use Google Maps for flying over your house has been realized by
Goggles. To set your own place as a start location follow this
description step by step. The tip came from
Gizmodo who adds:
Goggles takes map data from Google Maps, overlaying a little biplane over it. It's not really a mapping tool, as much as it is a game. Pull back to zoom out, divebomb to zoom in, being careful not to crash into the ground. Hitting the spacebar makes your plane fire, but there's nothing to shoot at, yet. All right, so that means its not really a game. But it's a nice way to explore a city from your desk.

I can imagine this idea will be the starting point for lots of others using Google Maps as a flight simulator.