The Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae), the largest funding source for home mortgages in the United States, has published special underwriting guidelines for the Covid-19 crisis. Plain English explanation of how the current guidelines will affect home financing appear on Fannie’s website as FAQs: https://singlefamily.fanniemae.com/media/22326/display The FAQs deal with such practical issues as acceptance of …
Category: News
News
Vermont Homebuying Covid-19 Real Estate Guidance
Stay Home Stay Safe Sector Specific Guidance New Rules effective April 20 for various occupations: https://accd.vermont.gov/covid-19/business/stay-home-stay-safe-sector-specific-guidance Guidance specifically for Real Estate Real Estate All professional services should be provided in a manner calculated to minimize in-person contact. Any activity that can be conducted remotely, online, by phone, or email, should beThe sale of real estate …
Vermont Announces $5,000 Downpayment Assistance
Thanks to a bill just passed by large majorities in both houses and signed by the governor, the Vermont Housing Finance Agency (VHFA) will soon be able to offer qualified first-time homebuyers a leg up in the form of a $5,000 “sleeping” loan. The $5,000 assistance be in the form of a zero interest loan, …
Real Estate Recovery: Wishful Thinking?
MLS data for Windham County shows median home prices during the first three-quarters of 2014 running 5.26% below median home prices for the same period a year ago. National real estate and other economic indicators are mixed and increasingly volatile, with even a fragile recovery, uncertain. The National Association of Realtors® (NAR) reports that prices …
Can we trust the statistics ?
This year, local housing statistics do not seem to reveal an obvious trend. Uncertainty in business is a yellow light, although caution might be somewhat mitigated when we look at the national trend. In a February 25, 2014 press release, Standard & Poor’s Case-Shiller 20 city index reports an 11.4% home price increase over the previous year. The release is misleadingly …
Brattleboro Real Estate Sales Up at End of 2012
Year-end (2012) MLS statistics for single-family homes show that Brattleboro home sales made solid gains in price, number of sales, and homes sold as a ratio of homes listed. Figures for number of sales in Windham County were also solidly up, but the rise in prices for the county was marginal. While the number of …
Brattleboro Real Estate – Home Prices Up
Statistics show that Brattleboro real estate at the end of November is up from this time last year exceeding the rising national trend. Nationally, the Case-Shiller 20 city index shows a 2% annual rise in home prices, as compared with a 7.3% rise in the median prices of Brattleboro homes sold during the first 10 …
First Quarter Home Sales: Cautious Optimism
According to 2011 year-end Multiple Listing Service (MLS) statistics, local Home prices dropped dramatically that year. What can we expect for 2012? For all all single family residences sold in Brattleboro in Calendar 2010 median sale price was 183,000, just $4,900 off from the median asking price of 186,900, In 2011 the median asking price …
Local Home Prices Drop
When people ask about real estate market conditions, generally the subtext is that they are really asking what things will be like six months or a year from now. Of course statistics can only tell us what has already occurred. Despite this inherent shortcoming: A sound statistical analysis can still give us a valuable perspective …
2010 Home Sales – Slump or Surge?
On January 25, 2011, the New York Times ran a story titled: “U. S. Home Prices Slump Again, Hitting New Lows.” The same day, the headline of the lead story in an online Realtor® newsletter was: “New Home Sales Surge.” Both stories were true. Each emphasized different facts. For our local real estate market, “Mixed Indicators” might …