Expert Advice from Neil

It’s scary to sign a big remodeling contract. Even if you check your contractor’s licenses and references, it’s natural to worry that his work won’t be up to par, he’ll take your deposit and disappear, or he’ll tell you the cost has gone up halfway through the project. A new startup company, Bolster, is capitalizing […]

These days few things start a fight on Capitol Hill faster than taxes. Despite the fact that three important tax benefits used by millions of American homeowners are days from expiring, Congress is unlikely to do anything to re-up them any time soon. So if you’re eligible, tax year 2013 is possibly the last time

As the mother of a high school junior, I twitch a little bit every time she talks to me about where she might like to attend college. Far too many of her choices have a sticker price of $60,000 a year once you add up room, board, books, tuition, and pizza. So I’m not surprised

In this era of rising energy prices and cost-conscious homeownership, we’ve noticed wood heat is enjoying a resurgence. Makes sense — in regions where wood is plentiful, you can heat an entire house for less than $1,000 per year. All that makes us intrigued by a relatively new generation of multi-fuel furnaces that can switch

Homeowners across the country shouldn’t be forced to pay for the sudden and dramatic flood insurance premium increases that are the unintended consequence of the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2012, insisted the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS® in testimony before the U.S. House Financial Services Subcommittee on Housing and Insurance. Some homeowners throughout the

Although conditions were mixed across the country, pending-home sales fell in October 2013 for a fifth consecutive month, according to the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS®. NAR’s Pending-Home Sales Index slipped 0.6% in October and was 1.6% below October 2012. The Pending-Home Sales Index measures the number of homes that are under contract to sell, where

Fewer existing homes sold in October, but prices continued to rise as home supply and demand continued to tilt toward owners in many markets, according to the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS®. The number of single-family homes, townhomes, condominiums, and co-ops sold in October fell 3.2%. However, that’s still 6% higher than the number of sales

Housing markets gained traction in 2013 – home equity is up, as are home prices, but lingering uncertainties about mortgage finance markets and tax reform will prevent a full housing market recovery, according to 2014 NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS® President Steve Brown. He spoke at a news conference today during his trade group’s conference in

With a fair amount of buzz recently about how some energy-efficient windows can create a laser-beam effect that warps siding on a neighboring house, we thought we’d check into the hubbub. Bottom-line: It doesn’t mean you should abandon your decision to invest in low-e (low-emissive) windows, which limit heat transfer so that your house stays

Based on what my REALTOR® friends tell me, getting a mortgage these days requires a ton of paperwork to prove that everything you said on your loan application was true. Did you really make the income you claim? Do you really have that much money in the bank? Can you prove you really did pay