Massachusetts Property Values

Strategies to Succeed In A Seller’s Real Estate Market: A Roundtable Discussion

by Rich Vetstein 03.11.2013 Closings

Put Your Best Offer Forward & Get Pre-Approved Beforehand, Advise Local Experts Well, it’s official now. With buyers back in droves, an abnormally low inventory of good properties, and bidding wars popping up all over the place, the Greater Boston real estate market has now made full circle into a seller’s market. As the Boston [...]

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Bright And Sunny Early, With A Chance Of Severe Job Cuts Later: The 2013 Massachusetts Real Estate Market Forecast

by Rich Vetstein 01.09.2013 Fannie Mae

Yesterday my firm sponsored a very informative breakfast seminar with veteran real estate journalist Scott Van Voorhis of Banker & Tradesman and Boston.com who offered his predictions on the 2013 Massachusetts real estate market. The presentation included a lively question and answer session with the 40+ Realtors attending from all over the Greater Boston area. [...]

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Hanging Off The Fiscal Cliff? What Will 2013 Bring To The Massachusetts Real Estate Market?

by Rich Vetstein 12.09.2012 Fannie Mae

High Anxiety Heading Into 2013 The term Fiscal Cliff should be as ubiquitous as “Merry Christmas” and “Happy Holidays” through the year-end, especially if President Obama and Congress cannot work out a deal to resolve the more than $500 billion in tax increases and across-the-board spending cuts scheduled to take effect after Jan. 1, 2013. If [...]

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Massachusetts Municipalities and Residents Gearing Up For Battle Over Medical Marijuana Dispensaries

by Rich Vetstein 11.11.2012 Massachusetts Property Values

Breaking: Attorney General Strikes Down Wakefield Ban on Dispensary Hazy Legal Landscape Providing Angst to Town Planners Massachusetts voters overwhelmingly approved the Medical Marijuana Ballot Initiative/Question 3 (click for full text), opening the door to the opening of at least 35 medical marijuana dispensaries throughout the state in 2013. But, the bigger question is whether the [...]

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Hurricane Sandy Massachusetts Real Estate Impact & Preparedness Bulletin

by Rich Vetstein 10.25.2012 Insurance

Impact on Pending Home Sales and Refinances Meteorologists are now predicting that early next week Hurricane Sandy will either pass close by or make a direct impact on New England. This storm is potentially huge, rivaling last year’s Hurricane Irene and the Perfect Storm of 1991. If you are closing on a property next week, you [...]

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Everything You Wanted To Know About Massachusetts Easements, But Were Afraid To Ask

by Rich Vetstein 04.18.2012 Easements

Utility, Gas Pipeline, Access, Drainage & Prescriptive Easements, and More! When you are considering purchasing a home in Massachusetts, the property may have the benefit or burden of an easement. Most easements and restrictions are quite “harmless” and standard, however, some can have a major impact on future expansion possibilities and the right to use [...]

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Driveways, Drainage, and Dirt Paths, Oh My! Massachusetts Easements Explained

by Rich Vetstein 04.17.2012 Easements

When you are considering purchasing a home in Massachusetts, the property may have the benefit or burden of an easement. Most easements and restrictions are quite “harmless” and standard, however, some can have a major impact on future expansion possibilities and the right to use portions of the property. In this post, I’m going to [...]

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Massachusetts Appeals Court Drops The Eviction Hammer On Post-Foreclosure Squatters

by Rich Vetstein 04.10.2012 Foreclosure

Common Eviction Defenses Ruled Unavailable To Squatters Who Lived Rent/Mortgage Free For 3 Years In a April 10, 2012 ruling, the Massachusetts Appeals Court just made it easier for foreclosing banks to evict squatters of foreclosed properties. This is one of the few pro-bank Massachusetts decisions coming out of the foreclosure crisis, and should help [...]

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Bidding Wars Are Back In Greater Boston! Legal And Strategic Guidance For Massachusetts Buyers & Sellers

by Rich Vetstein 03.24.2012 Condominium Law

I cannot believe I’m writing this post, but yes it’s true, the real estate market in Greater Boston, Massachusetts has now come full circle and bidding wars are back. Don’t believe me? Just read this Boston Globe article from today. Now that bidding wars are back, buyers and sellers have questions, so we’ll try to [...]

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Breaking News: Massachusetts Joins National Foreclosure Abuse Settlement

by Rich Vetstein 02.09.2012 Foreclosure
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Updated (2.9.12 6:30pm) In the largest national settlement since the tobacco litigation, the Boston Globe is reporting that Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley is expected today to sign on to a settlement brokered by attorneys general nationwide with five major US lenders over the banks’ role in the country’s foreclosure crisis. As we wrote about [...]

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2012 Massachusetts Real Estate Market Survey

by Marc Canner 01.22.2012 Massachusetts Property Values

January in the real estate industry is typically the time for the new year market outlook. For this coming year many of us have seen the template on the macro-economic data which most impacts the real estate industry: 8.5 % unemployment in the latest report, 30 year mortgage rates at record lows at or below [...]

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Appraisals, Assessments and Zestimates, Oh My!

by Rich Vetstein 10.25.2010 Appraisals
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Welcome back Guest Blogger, Gabrielle Daniels Brennan, from Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage, Sudbury, MA, Check out her fantastic blog, Living In Sudbury (www.liveinsudburyma.com). What Is Your Massachusetts Home Really Worth? OK folks, you want to know what your house is worth? Stop obsessing over your town assessment and online estimates. At the end of the [...]

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Can’t We All Just Get Along? A Realtor’s Expert Advice On Civility, Emotions And Not Taking The Massachusetts Real Estate Market Personally

by Rich Vetstein 09.19.2010 Appraisals
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Welcome back Guest Blogger, Realtor Gabrielle Daniels Brennan, from Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage, Sudbury, MA! Gabrielle and her mother-partner, Carole Daniels, just launched a fantastic blog, Living In Sudbury (www.liveinsudburyma.com), which our company, HubConnected, designed and created. Having grown up in Sudbury and now settled there with her family, Gabby’s knowledge of the Sudbury and [...]

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What Happens In Vegas Hopefully Stays In Vegas: Some Perspective On the Mass. Real Estate Market From Las Vegas

by Rich Vetstein 09.18.2010 Massachusetts Property Values
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My partner, Marc Canner, and I just returned from the Agent Reboot Conference in Las Vegas where we were promoting our new Real Estate Social Media company, HubConnected (click for more information). We learned a lot of new information about social media for real estate agents. But what really struck home was how horrible the [...]

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Debunking The July 2010 Housing Report: 5 Reasons Why Massachusetts Home Sales Will Continue To Rise

by Marc Canner 08.27.2010 Massachusetts Property Values
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A National Association of Realtor’s report released Wednesday indicated that home purchases fell 27% in July, a drop that jolted the real estate industry, according to the Wall Street Journal, and sent shock waves through the broader economy. As a result, a number of economists provided dire warnings of a continued down slide in real [...]

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Why The Bachelor & Bachelorette Need A Real Estate Agent

by Rich Vetstein 08.04.2010 Disclosures
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A Special Guest Post By Gabrielle Daniels Brennan, Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage, Sudbury, MA. Check out her Blog, Living in Sudbury www.liveinsudburyma.com! Similar to the obsession over Massachusetts real estate and addiction to the Multiple Listing Service (MLS) is our addiction to The Bachelor / The Bachelorette TV series. Many of us really didn’t want [...]

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McMansions Out Of Favor: New Homes Reportedly Getting Smaller

by Rich Vetstein 06.14.2010 Massachusetts Property Values
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The Wall Street Journal Blog has a very interesting article on the recent demise of McMansions: America’s love affair with McMansions continues to wane:  The size of new single-family homes completed last year fell 3.2% to 2,438 square feet, according to the National Association of Home Builders trade group, which analyzed Census data. It’s the [...]

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Real Estate Fear Factor: Dealing With Stigmatized Property

by Rich Vetstein 06.08.2010 Appraisals
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The well maintained 4 bedroom Colonial in a North Shore suburb with a great backyard looked nice enough thought “Debbie,” the buyer. However, she was dismayed to learn from neighbors after closing on the property, that the prior owner had committed suicide in the house. The real estate agent never advised her of this, and [...]

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When Good Fences Make Upset Neighbors: Adverse Possession Law In Massachusetts

by Rich Vetstein 06.02.2010 Adverse Possession

Click here to read about my most recent adverse possession trial win. Massachusetts Adverse Possession Law Robert Frost ‘s famous poem The Mending Wall says “good fences make good neighbors.” When that fence encroaches over a neighbor’s property line, that neighbor can turn from good to upset very quickly. When boundary or encroachments disputes arise, [...]

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The 2 Major Snags That Can Derail Your Mortgage Loan: Significant Home Repairs And A Low Appraisal

by Rich Vetstein 05.19.2010 Appraisals
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The mortgage lending underwriting environment has changed dramatically in the last several years. At the peak of the bubble, mortgage professionals joked that you needed only to be able to fog a mirror to get a loan. These days, even borrowers with good incomes and good credit scores can get turned down. Much of the [...]

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