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The thing I don't understand is the viewpoint of the old time vter's.
On the one hand they complain about high living expenses. Well this has a lot to do with the fact that VT is one of the highest taxes states in the nation. So the question is, why are these "old timers" so Liberal?
And why are they complaining about the "invaders" from NJ. Really I think you need to look in the mirror and ask why your senator is a Socialist. Maybe this explains why taxes/cost of living is so high??
It looks like much won't change, you just elected another democrat for mayor.
Good luck getting taxes lower now
The old time, real VT'ers are outnumbered now, that's why we have socialists running things...the NEK has the least outside influence but, after one town one vote was eliminated, it's nearly powerless to stop the fringe types from Burlington, Brattleboro, etc.
It's funny, I actually came up to Vermont because of the LOW cost of living! Granted, I'm not in the Chittenden co area, but I had the choice of moving either here or to DC for two job offers. Both had about the same pay, but with the exclusion of being able to foster a proper social life up here it was the right choice financially (given I was trying to get out of debt and the cost of living in DC is SOOOO much higher that anywhere in VT) and in terms of having a better, career nurturing job.
In the short term, compared to DC or Boston, the actual cost of housing is cheaper. I'd go with your choice, too, if given only those.
Long term VT does show it's high COL. Many people move in with a 1/2 decent paying job. However, if they lose it, they discover it's very difficult and/or takes a long time to replace. DC metro area has millions of people and is actively expanding. More positions exist, though not as plentiful as they were, thanks to the nature of the area. So directly comparing the long term COLs of the two areas is more of an apples to oranges proposition.
To do an apples to apples comparison, Vermont's COL needs to be compared to rural areas in the Mid-West or the rest belt with a compariable population base and economy. Once you look at how dirt cheap the housing in those areas, you discover that $250K for a house that needs work is a complete rip off.
The thing I don't understand is the viewpoint of the old time vter's.
On the one hand they complain about high living expenses. Well this has a lot to do with the fact that VT is one of the highest taxes states in the nation. So the question is, why are these "old timers" so Liberal?
And why are they complaining about the "invaders" from NJ. Really I think you need to look in the mirror and ask why your senator is a Socialist. Maybe this explains why taxes/cost of living is so high??
It looks like much won't change, you just elected another democrat for mayor.
Good luck getting taxes lower now
Bernie Sanders...the VT Socialist Senator isn't even FROM Vermont.
He transplanted himself here in 1964 from BROOKLYN, NY.
He's all for giving everything to everyone for "free" so the old people vote for him. The elderly population in Vermont is tremendous (nearly 15% are 65 and older) so the odds are in his favor at election time. In a state that has a population of barely 622,000 people that percentage holds a lot of weight.
Many people who live here now are looking for ways OUT. I know we are. Taxes alone have almost killed us. Our property taxes have doubled since 1999 when we bought our home. Water/sewer taxes have gone up 175%. Unfortunately, the income hasn't risen as quickly and it doesn't look like it is going to anywhere in the near future.
1) Section 8 does not pay mortgages.
2) There aren't houses to buy here. Act 250 ensures that.
Section 8 folks in Vermont, just like their counterparts in other states, mostly occupy rental housing which would not be included in any forclosure data.
BTW, Act 250 didn't stop the numerous housing developements in the Burlington area, for example, all built after Act 250 was enacted. Single family home construction is exempt from Act 250.
Last edited by MRVphotog; 11-30-2010 at 10:35 PM..
Section 8 folks in Vermont, just like their counterparts in other states, mostly occupy rental housing which would not be included in any forclosure data.
BTW, Act 250 didn't stop the numerous housing developements in the Burlington area, for example, all built after Act 250 was enacted. Single family home construction is exempt from Act 250.
Which housing developments in Burlington?
Act 250 permits are required for the following:
The construction of 10 or more housing units, including mobile-home parks, within 5 years.
The subdivision of land into six or more lots, within 5 years, in a town that does not have both permanent zoning and subdivision regulations.
The subdivision of land into 10 or more lots of any size within 5 years.
I am to understand that it is your contention that those regulations have not impeded the construction of single family housing in the state?
Of course section 8 goes to rentals, that was my point. People on section 8 can't be foreclosed.
Affordable for who? On what salary? I saw a property tax bill today for a home in Jericho valued at $200k. The property tax was $3400. Who can afford to add that amount of money to their mortgage, every year, on VT salaries?
Rich liberals? Seems like VT would have received a bunch of equity-rich people from BOS-WASH over the last couple decades that have driven home prices up, while most likely imposing stringent land use regulations. It is certainly the case in many of the nicer areas here in Oregon. A three decade stream of retirees, telecommuters, trustafarians, yoga instructors who struck it rich in the California housing bubble,etc. have driven prices sky high, even as wages are third rate. I have never been to Vermont, but from the picture and what I have read, both BT and NH would appeal to me a lot. However, as a liberal myself (albeit middle,middle class), I know VT has more of a ecotopia, granola reputation. This is part of the indoctrination mantra we all get at large, hyperliberal public universities on the coasts (..must buy free range ecofeminist-crafted tofu at Trader Joes, mountain bike, reggae, bikram yoga [preferably while practicing Kama Sutra moves with "partner"], after BURNING MAN move to Pacific Northwest, Colorado...Vermont...protest timber industry, buy SU..BA..RU, build 4,000 sf "ecohome" ... ).
Actually Vermont sounds great to me, but truth be told, I would probably like NH more, as I am sure it is just as lovely, and I am personally tired of living in rich liberal "foof" areas. I would rather live with old, cantankerous Yankees than with bongo slappers. Now that I've said that, I don't have anything against a few hippies, just want to be around at least a few people with roots in the area who did not arrive with a bag of cash from a city somewhere. Being a wage slave it is hard to compete.
I only speculate on all this, because the "liberal" meccas of the West (Boulder, CO, Bellingham, WA, Ashland, OR, Eureka, CA, Portland, Seattle, Missoula, Bozeman, Durango, Santa Fe, etc.) have been completely taken over by coastal equity and home prices are decoupled from wages. And everywhere I see the Subarus and yoga studios and dreadlocks and people who don't seem to do much working. Does this pattern fit Vermont or is the wealth home grown?
Last edited by Fiddlehead; 12-01-2010 at 03:31 AM..
The point I'm going to make is one that I could make on almost any given page at this site (that is, if I wanted to devote my life to this issue) because people are constantly attempting to compare the cost of heating or the cost of real estate or car insurance between one place and another. These comparisons are absolutely pointless. There's an old joke about a man who had himself frozen and reawakened a hundred years in the future. He'd left a small amount of money in an interest bearing account, so the first thing he does is run to a pay phone and call his bank. The bank tells him he has five million dollars and he whoops with joy and yells "I'm rich!" Then the operator cuts in and says "please deposit two million dollars for the next three minutes."
The point of my telling this story is that it doesn't matter in the least if real estate is cheaper in Vermont than in New York or car insurance is less than in Brooklyn. The ONLY thing that matters is the ratio between salary and expenses. This calculation is the only thing that will tell you whether your quality of life in a given place will be better or worse than where you are at present. Though I don't equate the amount of money one has with the level of happiness, living in rural New England for many years has taught me that being in constant fear and barely able to meet expenses is definitely not conducive to a high quality of life, even when surrounded by great beauty.
Other than that, if you're looking to move anywhere in New England (except metro Boston) you have to take into consideration the situation of the people who are offering the information you're using to make your decision. Rule number one: Chambers of Commerce and realtors want you to move here and spend your money. It's how they make a living. They know, better than anyone else, that most of the people they entice to come here will be gone in a few years and others will take their place. This is an indisputable fact of life in New England. If you know a hundred people who moved here from other places, five years later only one or two will still be here. Often they leave behind artifacts in the form of houses they can't sell that sit on the market, sometimes for years, draining their purses long after they've left. Rule number two: people who have been here for a long time and bought their houses in better times (and for vastly less money than you'll be able to) are in a situation that is in no way comparable to yours, so take that into consideration when you weigh their advice. They may have bought their houses for hundreds of thousands of dollars less than YOU will be able to buy a house. They may have paid off their mortgage and can therefore afford to pay the enormous property taxes that would cripple you, who would still have a mortgage to pay.
In beautiful places, like Vermont and Maine, people who move here from more prosperous places depart when the money they brought with them from elsewhere begins to run low, and they sell to people "from away" who are like they were a few years earlier. These sales (people leaving, people from out of state - who will in turn be leaving in a few years, or who are rich enough to buy and keep second homes - buying) are what keeps the real estate business going - to the extent that it's going at all. Natives of the area can't afford to compete with these people, having never had the higher wages that are paid in other places, so they often don't own a house unless they've inherited one.
My husband and I have lived in many, many places around the U.S. In all of these places, our standard of living had nothing at all to do with how expensive or cheap the cost of living was, but everything to do with the relationship between COL and what we could earn. We had the highest standard of living in the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania area and in Cranbury, New Jersey. In Pittsburgh, our salaries were below the national average for the kind of jobs we held, but not drastically so, and real estate and other costs were astonishingly cheap. In Cranbury (near Princeton, NJ) everything was very expensive, but our salaries, benefits and job security were exceptional and we lived extremely well. In Vermont, our expenses are as high as in New Jersey, but our salaries are $10,000.00 below the lowest range that one is expected to be paid for the jobs we do. In other words, a job that has a salary range, nationally, of $50,000 to $90,000 is paid $39,900 in Vermont. It is this discrepancy between wages and expenses that sends people out of New England after a few years, when they exhaust the savings they brought with them and really begin to feel the result of low wages. Benefits are something to consider as well, especially if there are any chronic illnesses in the family. Our health care policy in New Jersey covered everything; our health care policy in Vermont has a $5000 deductible and covers almost nothing.
What I've said reflects, of course, my own family's experience. It's not an uncommon one, which is evinced by the fact that most newcomers to rural New England are gone within a few years. I offer it in the hope that it will perhaps help a few people to arrive here with a clearer idea of what to expect.
I am to understand that it is your contention that those regulations have not impeded the construction of single family housing in the state?
Of course section 8 goes to rentals, that was my point. People on section 8 can't be foreclosed.
Affordable for who? On what salary? I saw a property tax bill today for a home in Jericho valued at $200k. The property tax was $3400. Who can afford to add that amount of money to their mortgage, every year, on VT salaries?
Act 250 was enacted in 1970, there have been many housing developements built in the Burlington area. When your on I89 passing the Taft Corners exit just look to the north and you'll see several. Your statement that there are no homes for sale due to Act 250 is utter nonsense. Act 250 does restrict large scale developement, no question about it but it doesn't eliminate it.
Your example is definately not affordable but Jericho has a very high property tax rate. BTW, where in Jericho is there a home valued at $200,000 other than a condo/townhouse type of housing. If it's a large extreme fixer-upper on some acerage, that could account for such a big tax bill. Check Vermont's real estate listings, several homes in the $200,000 price range all over the state with tax bills in the $1200 range with the Homestead Rebate for folks making less than $90,000.
Last edited by MRVphotog; 12-01-2010 at 09:20 AM..
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