FROM THE MAYOR’S OFFICE: Vaccine distribution
Community Content
Vaccination distribution will be a group effort in Newton with many providers needed as supplies increase and more people become eligible according to the Massachusetts Department of Public Health criteria.
Newton Health and Human Services is one of the providers. Last week, we finished up the first round of vaccinations for our first responders. We re also beginning to vaccinate some people living and working in Newton’s group home settings that meet the specific state criteria for congregate care programs and haven’t set up alternative arrangements.
“We know how frustrated all of us are about the spotty information for the Phase II vaccinations,” Mayor Ruthanne Fuller said.
The Martha s Vineyard Times
Coalition seeks to create housing bank
In 2005, one of our local papers ran a story: “The housing bank initiative has cleared its first major regional hurdle, now that all six towns have thrown their support behind the idea, which aims to create a bank of money for affordable housing using a transfer fee on most real estate transactions. The Martha’s Vineyard Land Bank is the model …”
Despite overwhelming support from voters in all six towns and the Vineyard real estate community, the effort failed in the state legislature due to lobbying by the Massachusetts Association of Realtors, which opposed the concept of transfer fees. At the time, the M.V. median home sale price was approximately $500,000.
Prepare to launch Jon Gorey
The words we might use to describe 2020 “tragic,” “turbulent,” “surreal,” “recessionary,” “isolating,” and, of course, “unprecedented” wouldn’t seem to suggest a booming real estate market. And yet, aside from a brief pause in early spring, the housing market remained red-hot this year, one of just a few bright spots in an otherwise strained economy.
When the sawdust settles on the 2020 housing market, Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the National Association of Realtors, expects the United States will end the year with a 3 percent increase in home sales and a 6 percent uptick in prices over 2019. The median price of a Massachusetts single-family house has risen even faster 11.3 percent, year to date through November, to $455,000, according to The Warren Group though sales were up just 1.5 percent from last year.
Jon Gorey - Globe Correspondent December 22, 2020 12:02 pm
The words we might use to describe 2020 “tragic,” “turbulent,” “surreal,” “recessionary,” “isolating,” and, of course, “unprecedented” wouldn’t seem to suggest a booming real estate market. And yet, aside from a brief pause in early spring, the housing market remained red-hot this year, one of just a few bright spots in an otherwise strained economy.
When the sawdust settles on the 2020 housing market, Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the National Association of Realtors, expects the United States will end the year with a 3 percent increase in home sales and a 6 percent uptick in prices over 2019. The median price of a Massachusetts single-family house has risen even faster 11.3 percent, year to date through November, to $455,000, according to The Warren Group though sales were up just 1.5 percent from last year.