In June of 2013 the City established a Task Force “for the purpose of examining and analyzing Hartford’s property tax system, and making recommendations for State legislation to rectify imbalances resulting from the system.” We follow the City’s property tax system closely, and the Task Force’s recently released final report makes this a good opportunity to quickly review Hartford’s current tax situation, analyze the recommendations of the Task Force and share our thoughts. Hartford’s property
Last week we published some charts showing the direction of the overall single-family market in Hartford County for 2013. The quick summary was that sales activity has been increasing nicely for two years, but median prices have been stuck in a protracted valley. The data tells a variety of different stories when we zoom in to the individual towns. Before we get there though, a quick disclaimer. It’s difficult to take too strong a position
Most of the year we avoid looking at prices when we analyze market statistics. Considering only a month’s (or even quarter’s) worth of data is risky because the sample size is too small, while making a more sophisticated model to account for the small sample size is beyond our abilities. However we are comfortable looking at a full year of data, and now that the calendar has turned over to 2014 we can look back
Single-family contracts fell to 514 in Hartford County for the month of November. The month was about 6% higher than the total from November of 2012, and the year-to-date count remains about 7% ahead of the 2012 pace. Agents we know have commented that there were parts of November when the market seemed suspiciously quiet – like so quiet that they didn’t trust their email was working properly. Despite that, the month ended with a
Would it be effective to market a home using black and white photography? All of the homes currently on the market feature color pictures in their listings, both in the MLS and in the miriad of consumer real estate websites. A property without color photos would stand out from the others online. What’s not clear is if the impression it makes would be a positive one. My first experiment with black and white was a
