Last week, the Joint Committee on Housing met to hear testimony about Governor Healey’s Affordable Homes Act. Speakers were held to 2-minute talks, and the talking went on from 11 AM to 10 PM. Governor Healey, Lieutenant Governor Driscoll, and Housing Secretary Edward Augustus spoke (in person). As did Mayor Michelle Wu of Boston (by
Anyone following real estate in the past three years or so has run into people who think that home inspection is (or should be) optional. Waiving home inspection has become a negotiation tool. This thinking plays into the interests of professional investors and hurts people who plan to owner-occupy their homes. It particularly harms first-time
The Boston Globe article about the transfer fee, last week, was pretty confusing. I think the R--®s like it that way. I wrote about similar transfer fee proposals just three weeks ago. Since then, I gave testimony to a committee at the State House in support of a transfer fee. Last week, a transfer fee
This summer, I have been out front on efforts that aid affordable housing in metro Boston. I was approached to work on an op-ed with colleague Brian Sullivan that was published at the end of August in the Boston Business Journal. It was about a proposed transfer fee in Massachusetts. A quick timeline on affordable housing: The
Affordable housing is not just a good idea. It is essential to a functioning economy. Eastern Massachusetts’s economy runs on hospitals, colleges, and businesses. They employ tech workers, building construction and maintenance workers, and many young professional workers. There is a chronic problem with recruiting nurses and entry level professionals because of the cost of
Why we insist on home inspection: Since 2020, our company has been swimming against the current when we insist that all our clients get home inspections. We are fiduciary agents; that means we need to give sound financial advice. It is not sound financial advice for a buyer’s agent to suggest that a buyer forego
Corporations who manage large portfolios of rental property want us to believe that supply and demand will keep the rental market affordable. Even in an affluent state, like Massachusetts, this is not true. Rents rise far faster than income. Renters choose between spending more than a third of their income or moving. “The reality is