David Stanley at Ridgeline Real Estate, 7997 Williston Road, Williston, VT (2026)

08/05/2026

A peek of Camel's Hump in a simple, modern mountain retreat.

08/05/2026

If Winooski is dense and Essex Junction moves fast, Colchester is different.

I've spent the past few months writing about Chittenden County's tightest and hottest markets. Both Winooski and Essex Junction are compressed markets with a clear identity and a narrow band of what a buyer can expect to find. Colchester is the sprawling, varied, whatever-you-need town in Chittenden County. Wider geographic footprint, wider price range, and more distinct sub-markets than anywhere else in the county.

The range is genuinely striking.

Over the past six months, the lowest priced closed sale in Colchester was a mobile home on leased land at $91,500. The highest was $2,255,000. Even if you set aside the mobile home segment, the range from $349,000 to over $2 million for homes on owned land is nearly a 7x spread. No other Chittenden County town produces that kind of variety.

The data:

Median single-family sale price: $519,715. Condo median: $355,900. Year-over-year price growth is 1.1%, which is modest but stable.

Median days on market: 6. Across both single-family and condo. That's the tightest DOM of any hyperlocal post I've written so far.

46.7% of Colchester homes closed above list price in July. Stronger than the county-wide 37%.

56 active listings, 58 closed sales over six months, 32 currently pending.

Colchester's sub-markets matter more than in most Chittenden County towns because they each behave differently.

Waterfront and lake-adjacent is where Colchester's highest prices live. Homes on Malletts Bay and along the Champlain shoreline command real premiums, and most transactions in this segment are cash. If you're competing for a waterfront home, plan accordingly.

Near Airport Park is one of the fastest-moving pockets in Colchester, driven by proximity to the paved bike path and deeded beach access at Bayside. Recent examples like 170 Biscayne Heights and 92 Dunlop illustrate why this area consistently sells quickly. Recreation and location combine cleanly, and buyers reward it with speed and competition.

Fort Ethan Allen and the more urban residential streets closer to the Winooski line offer traditional dense residential housing, closer to Burlington proper. Common landing spot for buyers priced out of Burlington who still want urban proximity.

The outlying rural areas offer larger lots, more land, and quieter settings for buyers who want space over walkability.

Under $600K, financed with traditional mortgages, is where most non-waterfront transactions happen. Very few homes in this price band sell for cash, which matters if you are a cash buyer in that range. You'll typically stand out.

Honest tradeoffs worth naming: Colchester has no dense walkable downtown. Housing stock quality varies significantly across the town, so inspections and neighborhood research matter more than in tighter markets. Waterfront competition is fierce and often cash. And the geographic sprawl means the specific Colchester sub-neighborhood you land in matters more than in most other towns.

If you're not sure which Chittenden County town fits your situation, Colchester is often the first place I recommend looking. The range means you're likely to find something.

Full breakdown on the blog: https://davidstanleyrealty.com/blog/why-colchester-has-the-most-range-of-any-chittenden-county-market

08/01/2026

Vermont housing in 2026 gets a C+.

Every few months a buyer asks me some version of the same question. Is now actually a good time to buy, or does it just feel impossible?

The honest answer isn't one number. Affordability is several forces pulling in different directions at once, and the honest answer depends on which ones you weigh most heavily.

So I put together a report card. Grades assigned category by category, based on real Vermont and Chittenden County data. I'm grading honestly rather than optimistically, because a report card where everything gets a B+ isn't a report card, it's a promotional piece.

Home Prices: C+
Median single-family sale price in Chittenden County is $575,000, up 1.1% year over year. Vermont never had the 2021-2022 speculative run-up that Austin, Phoenix, and much of Florida did, so we're not in the middle of a correction now either. Prices are elevated but they aren't climbing so fast that waiting is likely to reward you.

Mortgage Rates: C-
Thirty-year fixed rates are hovering around 6.75%. Historically not extreme (rates were higher through much of the 1990s), but the math is genuinely tough. On a $500K mortgage, a single point drop from 6.75% to 5.75% saves over $300 a month and nearly $115,000 over the life of the loan. Trying to time rates is a losing game. If you can afford the payment today, you can buy today.

Inventory: C+
Chittenden County had 154 active listings in April, up modestly from 146 a year ago. Days on market is 23 to 28 across every price band. A functional market, not a broken one. But competitive segments are tight. Winooski has more homes currently pending than actively listed. Essex Junction has 41 pending against 36 active. In those segments, buyers still need to move fast.

Wage Growth vs. Housing Costs: B-
This is the category most affordability headlines skip. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Vermont wages grew 5.7% from June 2025 to June 2026. Home prices grew about 5.4% over the same period. For the first time in several years, wages are keeping pace with prices. That's a real shift.

The multi-year picture is still weaker. The gap that accumulated between 2020 and 2024 is real. Twelve months of parity doesn't undo four years of divergence. But the direction has changed and that matters more than most affordability content acknowledges.

Down Payment & Assistance Programs: B+
Most buyers misunderstand VHFA. The common assumption is that it's a down payment assistance program that helps a small number of low-income buyers. In practice, most of the buyers I work with who qualify for VHFA programming don't qualify for down payment assistance itself. What they qualify for is a meaningfully better interest rate than they'd get on a standard conventional mortgage. On a $500K loan, even a half-point rate improvement saves roughly $150 a month and tens of thousands over the life of the loan.

If you're buying in Vermont and you haven't asked a lender specifically about VHFA options, you're leaving money on the table.

The Overall Grade: C+

Vermont housing in 2026 is not easy. Prices are elevated, rates are high, inventory is tight in the segments most buyers actually want. That's the honest picture.

But it isn't broken either. Wages are keeping pace with prices for the first time in years. Rate improvements through VHFA are available to more buyers than most people realize. And the market is functional, clearing efficiently, and generally rewarding buyers and sellers who make good decisions.

A C+ market is a market where the strategy matters. The buyers I see succeeding in 2026 are the ones who work with a lender to understand every dollar of their real monthly payment before offering, who explore VHFA and other programs, who buy at their comfortable number rather than their qualifying number, and who move decisively when the right home appears.

Full breakdown on the blog: https://davidstanleyrealty.com/blog/vermont-housing-affordability-report-card

07/14/2026

Big news out of Washington that's worth knowing about if you're thinking about buying a home in Vermont.

Congress just passed the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, the largest federal housing bill in decades, and it's designed to address something a lot of buyers here already know firsthand: there just aren't enough homes on the market, especially at prices that work for working families.

The National Association of Realtors estimates that roughly 310,000 homes priced at $261,000 or less are simply missing from the market nationally. When you don't have enough homes to go around, buyers end up in competition for whatever comes available, or they put off buying altogether. That's been the reality in Chittenden, Franklin, and Addison Counties for a while now.

This law is a step in the right direction. Here's what's in it that matters most for Vermont:

Vermont already has a head start on "pattern books," called 802 Homes, which are pre-approved home designs that make permitting faster. Federal funding is now available to expand that work.

Manufactured housing gets a major update. New design flexibility, higher FHA loan limits, and lower production costs could mean more naturally affordable homes, especially in rural parts of the state.

Infill development gets easier. Homes built on existing lots in established neighborhoods can now move through federal environmental review faster.

Vacant commercial buildings can be converted into housing through a new pilot grant program, something that could benefit several Vermont downtowns.

Vermont will automatically receive all of its eligible Opportunity Zone designations under the new federal cycle, making our communities a priority for housing investment.

The Whole-Home Repairs program creates grants and forgivable loans to help homeowners and landlords fix up aging homes. A lot of Vermont's housing stock needs exactly that kind of support.

One thing I want to be honest about: this won't change the market tomorrow. Federal programs take time to work their way down to the local level. But the direction is right, and Vermont was already doing a lot of this work on its own. Now the federal government is behind it too, and that matters.

If you've been sitting on the sidelines waiting for things to loosen up, the groundwork is being laid. More supply is coming.

Full breakdown on the blog: https://davidstanleyrealty.com/blog/a-new-federal-housing-law-just-passed

07/07/2026

Why Essex Junction Is the Hottest Market in Chittenden County:
I tell my clients this all the time and I want to make the case publicly.
Essex Junction is the hottest real estate market in Chittenden County right now.
That's not a gut feeling. The data backs it up unequivocally, and the picture is striking.
Six months of Essex Junction data:
Median sale price for single-family homes: $514,785. Condos and townhomes: $375,117.
Median days on market: 7. That's not a typo. Across every closed Essex Junction sale in the past six months, the median time from listing to under contract is one week.
Closed sales in the past six months: 116. That's nearly 10x the volume of Winooski at the same speed. Essex Junction isn't just fast, it's a substantially larger and more active market moving at the same clip.
40.9% of homes closed above list price in June. The list-to-sale ratio was 100.1% in June and 102.3% in May. Sellers are consistently getting full asking price and often more.
And here's the stat that made me stop when I saw it: 41 properties currently pending, with a median days on market of just 6. There are more homes currently under contract in Essex Junction than there are actively listed. The market is turning over inventory faster than it can restock. That's the definition of a hot market with unmet demand.
Here's what makes Essex Junction different from other fast markets in the county. The heat isn't concentrated at the entry level. Recent higher-priced pending sales include 80 Brigham Hill Road, 46 Lost Nation Drive, and 30 Tyler Drive. Homes in that bracket, in most surrounding towns, would be sitting for months or requiring price reductions. In Essex Junction, they're pending in days. That's the signature of a market with genuine, broad-based demand.
At the more affordable end, the tightest competition is in the neighborhood of Native American-named streets bounded roughly by Pearl Street to the north and Park Street to the east. Streets like Abnaki, Seneca, Iroquois, Mohawk, South Summit, and Hiawatha. Move-in ready homes there consistently draw multiple offers. 90 West Street and 15 Abnaki are recent examples, with 6 and 17 offers respectively.
Why is Essex Junction consistently this hot? A combination of things that's genuinely hard to find elsewhere in the county: excellent Essex Westford schools, The Essex Experience (the converted outlet mall now home to local shops, restaurants, and breweries), the Five Corners crossroads, Maple Street Park, Amtrak Vermonter service to New York City and DC, and proximity to major employers like GlobalFoundries. It's a city with a small-town Vermont feel, and that combination is rare.
The honest tradeoff worth naming: Essex Junction does not have a concentrated walkable downtown the way Burlington or Winooski does. Most amenities require a car. For some buyers that's a real drawback. For others it's a feature. Worth thinking about which side you sit on.
If Essex Junction is on your list, you need to be ready to move fast when the right home appears. If it isn't on your list yet, it should be.
Full breakdown on the blog: https://davidstanleyrealty.com/blog/why-essex-junction-is-the-hottest-market-in-chittenden-county

06/20/2026

If you're buying in Chittenden County under $500,000 and Winooski hasn't been on your list, I want to make a case here.
I pulled six months of Winooski-specific data this week and the picture is more extreme than I expected. Let me walk you through it.

Median sale price for single-family homes in Winooski: $453,500. For condos: $421,500. Year-over-year price growth has been a steady 2.4%, not the runaway appreciation you see in some hot markets. This is healthy, sustainable growth on top of an already-elevated base.

Median days on market: 7. Across every closed Winooski sale in the past six months, the median time from listing to under contract is one week. For context, Chittenden County overall is 23 to 28 days across every price band. Winooski is moving roughly four times faster than the county as a whole.

Active inventory in Winooski right now: 8 homes. Eight, for a city of 7,500 people. That's extreme scarcity.

40% of homes closed above list price. List-to-sale ratio is 100.5%. Both numbers are stronger than the county-wide figures (37% and 98.3%).

And the pending pipeline confirms the trend. Of the eight properties currently pending in Winooski, the median days on market is nine. Same story as the closed sales. Well-priced homes get under contract in about a week, every time.

Two recent listings on Shepard Street, 95 and 99, both sold over list price this spring. What I'd point out to any buyer considering them is that the homes themselves offer real value compared to what you'd get in Burlington's Old North End or South Burlington at the same price point. You are not paying a Burlington premium for a Winooski address. You are getting more home for your money, plus access to a real walkable downtown.

Who's actually buying in Winooski right now? Young professionals, young families, first-time buyers stretched out of Burlington proper, and a meaningful investor segment still picking up duplexes and triplexes. The investor presence is part of why inventory stays so tight, when a property gets purchased as a rental, it doesn't recycle back to the resale market.

The honest tradeoffs: traffic through downtown and around the roundabout can feel meaningfully more congested than other Chittenden County towns. F-35 noise is a fair concern but it isn't really worse than the surrounding towns. Schools are a personal call that deserves a real look. And the scarcity that makes Winooski a smart buy means you need to be ready to move fast when the right home appears.

If you're shopping in Chittenden County and Winooski hasn't been on your list, it should be.

Full breakdown on the blog:https://davidstanleyrealty.com/blog/why-winooski-is-the-smartest-buy-in-chittenden-county-right-now

06/08/2026

When a buyer's offer gets accepted, two things happen at once. The first is celebration. The second is overwhelm. The period between "your offer was accepted" and "here are your keys" is the part of the home buying process almost no one explains clearly up front. It's also where deals most often fall apart. Not because of anything dramatic. Usually because of small misunderstandings or surprises nobody prepped the buyer for.
Here's the thing nobody tells you about the 30 to 45 day window between offer and closing. It is not a steady, even-paced march to the finish line. The rhythm goes like this: The first two weeks are extremely busy and front-loaded with deadlines. The middle stretch is mostly waiting and feels suspiciously quiet. The last two weeks pick up again as closing approaches. Knowing that ahead of time changes the experience completely. The quiet middle isn't a sign that something is wrong. It's a sign that everything is on track.

Week one is the heaviest. You'll submit your earnest money deposit, schedule your inspection, choose your closing attorney, get every document your lender requests, and pay for the appraisal. By Friday of week one, most buyers feel like they've already done most of the work of buying the home.

Week two is inspection day. I attend every inspection with my buyers because it's one of the most useful learning moments of the process. After the report comes back, we work through the contingency together. Repairs, credits, accept as-is, or in significant cases, walk away.

Weeks three and four are the hurry up and wait stretch. The lender is underwriting. The appraiser is taking their time. Your attorney is searching title. From your seat as the buyer it feels like nothing is happening. It isn't. A lot is happening, just not where you can see it. Use this time to shop for homeowner's insurance, and do not open new credit, finance a car, or change jobs. Credit gets pulled again right before closing.

The last two weeks pick back up. Utilities setup. Final closing numbers. Wire transfer (be extremely careful about wire fraud, always verify wire instructions by calling your attorney directly). Final walkthrough within 24 hours of closing to confirm the home is clean, empty of the seller's belongings, and systems are working. Then closing itself, usually 45 to 60 minutes at your attorney's office. Then keys.

The 30 to 45 days between offer and closing is the part of buying a home where having the right agent is crucial. Not before you make the offer, when you're touring and dreaming. After, when the process gets technical and small mistakes can have big consequences.

Full breakdown on the blog: https://davidstanleyrealty.com/blog/what-actually-happens-between-offer-and-closing

If you're thinking about buying or selling in Vermont and want to walk through what this actually looks like before you're in it, send me a message or give me a call. (802) 779-1036.

06/02/2026

Congrats to my buyers who now proudly own not one, but two very 70's sinks! Yes, there was a blue toilet and bathtub to match!

06/02/2026

What overpricing your home actually costs you.

Almost every seller I sit down with has a number in their head before I walk through the door. Sometimes that number is right on target. Sometimes it's a number that, if we listed there, would cost the seller real money. Not in theory. In dollars on the closing statement.

Here's how it actually works:
The most motivated and qualified buyers in your market are watching for new listings every day. Many of them have alerts set up. They've been touring for weeks. They know what comparable homes look like and they're ready to act when something new and well-priced hits the market.
The first 7 to 14 days your home is active is when those buyers make decisions. That window is when you get your best showings, your strongest offers, and your highest likelihood of multiple bids pushing your sale price up.
If you're priced right, that window works for you. If you're priced too high, those buyers see your listing, do quick math, and move on. They are not coming back when you reduce three weeks later. By the time you've cut the price, the buyer pool is smaller, less motivated, and more skeptical.
The result is almost always a longer time on market and a final sale price lower than you would have gotten by pricing right from day one.
That's the paradox of overpricing. Asking for more usually gets you less.

What it actually costs you:
You lose the buyers who would have paid the most. The aggressive, competitive ones who would have pushed your sale price up. They see your home in week one, decide it's overpriced, and buy something else.
You pay carrying costs every month it sits. Mortgage, taxes, insurance, utilities. In Vermont that runs $3,000 to $5,000 monthly on a mid-range home.
Your listing gets stale. Buyers see the days-on-market count on Zillow and wonder what's wrong with it.
Price reductions signal weakness. Buyers don't see a deal. They see a desperate seller and offer below the new price.
The Chittenden County data this spring backs all of this up. Only 13.4% of Vermont listings have taken a price reduction before selling, compared to 34% nationally. 37% of Chittenden County homes are selling over asking. The list-to-sale ratio is 98.3%. Days on market is 23 to 28 across every price band.

Translation: sellers who price to market are winning. Sellers who price to a hopeful number are watching the well-priced home down the street go under contract while their own listing goes stale.

The most important conversation I have with every seller I work with is the conversation about price. Not your hopeful price. The price that will actually get you the strongest possible outcome.
Full breakdown on the blog: https://davidstanleyrealty.com/blog/what-overpricing-your-home-actually-costs-you
If you're thinking about listing this summer, let's talk it through honestly. Send me a message or give me a call. (802) 779-1036.

05/21/2026

How much home can you afford?
Almost every buyer I work with starts with that question. It's the right question to ask. But it has two different answers, and most people don't realize that until they're already over their head.
The first answer is your lender's number. They plug in your income, your debts, your credit, your down payment, and they hand you a maximum loan amount. That number is a ceiling, not a recommendation. It's the most they're willing to lend you while still being reasonably confident they'll get paid back. It is not the same as the amount that will feel comfortable in your actual life.
The second answer is the one you have to figure out yourself. What payment can you make every month while still saving for retirement, taking the occasional vacation, handling a $5,000 furnace replacement when it happens, and living the life you actually want? That number is almost always lower than the lender's max. Sometimes meaningfully lower.
The gap between those two numbers is where "house poor" lives. It's the most preventable problem in real estate, and it's also the one I see most often when buyers shop at their absolute ceiling.
A few Vermont realities worth knowing if you're new to homeownership here:
Property taxes are real. Mid-range homes in Chittenden County commonly carry annual tax bills of $6,000-$12,000.
Heating costs add up. A typical Vermont home runs $2,500-$5,000 per winter depending on the system and the insulation.
Older homes bring older everything. Roofs, furnaces, windows, plumbing. Maintenance on a 100-year-old home comes in surprise lumps, not predictable monthly amounts. Budget 1-2% of your home's value per year for upkeep.
None of that shows up in your lender's preapproval calculation.
The single most important rule I give every buyer: before you submit an offer on a specific home, have your lender calculate the actual monthly payment for that property at your offer price. Not your preapproval estimate. The real number with the real taxes, the real insurance, the real interest rate. A great local lender will do this in a few minutes. Make it a habit on every offer.
Buying a home should improve your life, not constrain it. The buyers I see five years after closing who still feel good about their decision are almost always the ones who bought below their ceiling, not at it.
Full breakdown on the blog:
https://davidstanleyrealty.com/blog/how-much-home-can-you-afford

David Stanley at Ridgeline Real Estate

08/05/2026

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