I mean, have you seen the posts of people looking to move to Vermont who are consulting Reddit? And I would bet that 99% of the people who can afford to cash offer on a home in VT from out of state aren't consulting reddit about where to move their life to and have a vague idea but assume it's like the housing crisis in the rest of the country and not nearly as bad as it is.

https://www.sevendaysvt.com/vermont/obstruction-zone-how-vermonts-land-use-regulations-impede-new-development-and-complicate-the-states-housing-crisis/Content?oid=35279122

Act 250 actually has discouraged good growth and made McMansions about the only thing you can build because a Mcmansion does not immediately trigger Act 250 or zoning issues... a few might but even then its a low barrier to clear because its one home instead of multiple.

I disagree with that assessment two-fold. Act 250 can prohibit development by starving a builder of the funds to complete a project through "slowing development". There are some segments of society that have extra cash and try to build something with it, but Act 250 frequently punishes those who try by making it such an onerous and expensive undertaking. Owning land, paying taxes and mortgages, permitting on local & state levels, staff to repeatedly draw up plans to satisfy govt, neighbors, and random interested parties is expensive - let alone funding it without breaking ground for 15 - 20 years or until someone runs out of money or gives up. Thats insane, it disincentives people from building.

If you look at stats put out by the VHFA, people just stopped building in the late 90s, early 2000s (way before 2008). There are also a LOT of people that move here for the "Vermont way of life" and then fight every development that could serve to house people born here to keep their bucolic dream alive. This pushes development to be expensive sprawling messes where someone can get a foothold and run with it instead of smart, mixed use, downtown intensive development.

Which hurts people born in Vermont the most by restricting the number of homes on the market and allowing outside buyers to scoop up what remains, who are then widely resented for an issue they stumbled into. Would recommend reading this article by Seven Days from last year that does a good job at explaining the way NIMBYS wield Act 250 to protect their own housing interests.

https://www.sevendaysvt.com/vermont/obstruction-zone-how-vermonts-land-use-regulations-impede-new-development-and-complicate-the-states-housing-crisis/Content?oid=35279122

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**Edited because the stats are put out by VHFA not VHCB, used the wrong acronym!

Barre City - not Barre Town or Berlin would be in that price range. Similar with Northfield, Plainfield or Williamstown but those are a little bit farther out with not as many amenities.

This was really a one time funding coupled with Leahy's seniority in the senate pulling weight. With him retiring it will be a while before we have that influence again.

Highly recommend the Hearthstone Green Mountain Series! We have a 60 and it heats our 1500sf home pretty well. (plus its a Morrisville based company!)

The catalyst makes the logs last longer & get more heat out of the wood. There is currently a federal 22% tax credit for installing an efficient woodstove which helps cut down on the upfront cost & VT Efficiency has a $400 rebate for replacing an old stove with an energy efficient one.

Do you belong to one of the Credit Unions around? VSECU has VHeat where you lock in how many gallons of oil you'll buy over the winter & it locks your price per gallon- which is lower than the market rate.

Would also recommend looking at what your insulation situation is like- VT Efficiency has some work on that as well.

For example- we were getting oil fill ups once a month last year (eek!), saw the way the oil prices were going and decided to bite the bullet and get a woodstove. We've only needed one oil fill up so far since last May & still have a 1/4 of a tank. The caveat is that we both work from home. But we do our last load of wood around 10 pm and oil kicks on around 5 am- which is almost a full work day. Plenty of hot coals left to restart the fire around 7 am.

That's definitely true & I've lived in other rural parts of vermont where it wasn't an issue. But watching someone snowmobile over our property- its not like I can (or would want to look so crazy) as to run out after them. So for now we'll post it & contact VAST about what to do

Personal opinion that requiring an owner to post every so many feet on their land every single year to prevent trespassers is onerous and as VT's population ages, not a reasonable bar to set for a home owner.

Also, people walk/ ski across our lot but last year people started snowmobiling on it to reach VAST trails & signs are going up this year.

Sorels! And look for something with a little bit of a tooth. In college in particular things like Bean boots get hyped up but I've found that they're the slipperiest. And yes, yak trax and ice stabilizers can help on the worst of days, but a reliable boot for 5 months out of year is important.