Driving up a nearby Vermont mountain pass one day I noticed a new pond being built; adding ponds is a fantastic property improvement as almost everyone loves water and waterfront property. Pulled over, knocked on the door of the house, and got the pond installer’s number.

He sounded great on the horn so we scheduled a site visit to see if my own property could handle a pond. He showed up on time but once he saw the lot which is just over an acre he said that the property was too small. Did I realize just how much dirt would come out of an excavated pond? Where would I put it as otherwise it could be expensive to have one truckload after the other hauled away.

Not even close to being game.

The second pondmeister was too busy to schedule a site visit and only returned one call. Yikes. I know I’m not the only one in Vermont with trouble getting a contractor to call back, not-to-mention reliably show up for work. With Vermont real estate having sailed through the Covid hoop of insane demand, low inventory and lightning fast appreciation, the land market has benefitted and builders have seen a boom in demand leaving Vermont home owners that would like some work done scratching their heads for solutions.

After an initial quest to find someone to dig, it came to me. Why not tackle the ponds myself? I sold a house in Winooski to some clients years ago that had a massive basement that the seller had, are you ready, completely excavated on his own with a shovel and wheelbarrow. No way, right? Risky business.

Am I out of my mind? Clearly.

Nor did I give any thought to the physical wear and tear involved and instead focused on wow, anything is possible.

Bam! I show up at Champlain Valley Equipment in Essex, VT to look into the far fetched notion of buying an excavator to add to my real estate agency mechanicals. Manager Chris Gibson was absolutely amazing, laid back, accommodating and completely tolerant of my ignorance of these big machines. Yes, I'd rented an excavator a couple of years ago for a couple of weeks to grade a road, driveway and do some stone wall, drainage and patio work but I hit the house with the boom a few times. Shallow experience for sure, but enough to be bitten by the power of hyrdaulics bug.

Within a week the Kubota KX-057-5 was in my driveway, bucket with thumb (critical for picking up rocks, etc.) and a spare 48’ grading bucket. Enclosed cabin with Bluetooth for the Smashing Pumpkins, AC for the sizzlers and heat for the snowflakes. Stylin’ and ready for a project way bigger than expected.

There was more to do than just excavate ponds as the lot had been wet and, after losing some fruit trees to damp feet and getting the zero-turn stuck in the muddy grass, drying things out became a priority. Sitting at the bottom of a mountain, snowmelt in the spring created a seasonal stream and damp conditions that would inundate the garden and delay getting the entire lawn cut sometimes for many weeks.

First then: drainage. Started by digging a french ditch along the easter line all the way down to the lot corner, increasingly deep, then along the south boundary to dry out most of the acre. Next, ditching along the town road to install perforated pvc drainage pipe in crushed stone wrapped in landscaping cloth to handle the western line impermeable road run-off. That took days and unearthed so many rocks which fueled new stone walls.

Six days and three blown hydraulic hoses later: three ponds excavated. As I dug and scraped the biggest of the three, soon came the sound of metal scraping rock; reams of ledge dictated where the excavation would stop. Understanding the center of gravity takes a little time and thrice I nearly capsized, an unnerving experience on a 12,000 plus pound piece of metal and glass. Whoa silver! Rattled but not broken, and so much more careful and respectful of the beast. Driver beware.

An early risk was excavating two Asian apple pear trees in June, already bearing fruit, as they were in the path of progress. Amazingly, replanting took and neither fruit tree died, sweet salvation. The apple pears are exquisite.

A huge pre-historic, six foot tall twelve foot wide boulder that also sat in the path of progress wasn’t going to move unless Godzilla showed up so I dug around it, creating what would be a solitary stone island, a little worried it would sink into the pond and displace hundreds of gallons of water in one fell swoop. Still standing, that big honkin' stone is the site of future potential diving platform.

At three elevations with the house looking out over the smallest first pond, 2^nd medium and third largest, gravity takes the water cascading. With no spring or stream on the lot but a very high producing 40 gallons per minute well, there was, with a little luck, enough water not just for domestic consumption but also to establish water world. Time would tell.

The inner-pond plumbing would be twin SDR 35 pvc six inch pipes with rotating 90 degree elbows and baskets to rotate and lower the pond level if ever needed. Out of the three pond connections the lower, large pond set leaked like a sieve; not enough dirt bedding placed around and in between the pipes so I had to tear them out and reinstall which stopped that hemorrhaging.

So much ledge, so much stone. Looking into the pond cavities there were so many veins of ledge, I was pretty sure all three ponds would drain faster than I could fill them, even if the soil never had great drainage to start, and the whole project would end in disaster and refilling the signicant craters.

The day when all three ponds were dug and shaped, plumbed and ready to test arrived. Out came the hose and we held our breath for the week or so it took the smallest upper pond to fill. Amazingly, the water held. With the hose turned off, the water quickly became stagnant and within 24 hours major algae blooms. The dragonflies that swopped in were stunning. 

The second pond eastern wall leaked fast enough in one section that the wet soil was falling away. Picture massive mudslides and spineless retaining walls. Oh. No.

Even after re-installing the SDR 35 outlet pipes, the largest pond was even worse. A solid half the length of the south berm was streaming water through leading to immediate erosion and collapse of outer berm sections, in spite of repeated compaction efforts with the excavator. That went on for a few weeks until I realized chasing your tail might not be the most productive path and could be never ending.

Advance research can really pay off.

Before tackling this mammoth little summer real estate project, I’d looked into pond sealants, having heard of bentonite which I used as a former ceramic artist, almost always applied before filling a pond in water. Enter TJ Hudson out of Lincoln, Nebraska, a nationally recognized pond expert who, after nearly going bankrupt trying to save his own failing ponds, has dedicated his life to leak abatement science.  Wonderfully personable and open, we spent an hour talking and based on all of my preliminary findings, his experience and wholesale dealing of a two part polymer called Seekleak (aka Soilfloc) was the answer.

As per Americansportfish.com: “Polymer is a large molecule, or macromolecule, composed of many repeated subunits. Polyacrylamide, which composes this product, (IUPAC poly (2-propenamide) or poly (1-carbamoylethylene), (abbreviated as PAM), is a polymer (CH2CHCONH2-) formed from acrylamide subunits. It can be synthesized as a simple linear-chain or cross-linked (Acrylamide & Potassium Acrylate).

Is it safe?

Soilfloc is 99% insoluble, non-toxic, biodegradable, environmentally friendly, and USDA approved for use in agriculture.  It will not harm plants, marine life, or livestock.”

Brilliantly, it’s possible to do wet applications after building and filling a pond. Though how much you need requires estimating water volume, I ordered just one unit of two 55 pound bags, parts one and two, going with my instincts that as the porosity was limited to certain sections of the berms rather than all around the ponds, a surgical application would ring the bell. Seekleak is evidently better than products like Damit, (another polymer out of Australia). The Seekleak arrived in two days via fedex after shelling out $530 (vs over $700 per unit on some other websites) and nearly $180 for the freight, but what a great gamble and far less expensive than repeated exavator compaction and berm rebuilding forays.

Here is a shot of an application, part one sprinkled over the water followed by part two. It’s the pull of a leak that draws the polymer into the fissures, expanding and creating an effective seal over a few days. It’s slimy once combined; the pond floor and walls will feel gooey for a while, a minor compromise given the water proofing. My first application went a long way to slowing the bleeding and the berms, after a second targeted dusting, showed no more significant porosity.

The big pond finally filled completely and the outlet pipe overflows started working as they should, music to my ears as I could finish building up the outer pond walls, compaction work and seed the pond perimeter with grass for structural reinforcement.

Still flush in stone, I installed check dams through the drainage ditch to slow water & filter silt. Then armed the drainage ditch curve with large stones and the largest pond outlet pipes flow landing with stones to offset erosion.

Ample surplus stone formed the patio by the big pond and a landing for the aeration system soon to arrive.

More ditching to bury the weighted aeration system air hoses and underground Southwire 10/3 gauge from the house all the way down to the largest pond to power the aeration compressor, overhead lights and electrical outlets.

The Rotary vane compressor aeration system from EasyPro via Amazon to save on shipping would make noise (less than a piston compressor). Aeration systems are wonderful for pond health and preventing algae, even if a aquatic plant ecosystem is the best natural filtration system.

Research into decibel reduction and sound proofing led me to the fantastic Zombie Box which would enclose the compressor box (already packed with sound insulation) so that the only sound one would hear would be the Zombie Box fan and not the high pitch whining of the rotary vane compressor. What a difference intel makes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A killer silencer it is all the way from Arizona that they call the "Peacemaker" to placate otherwise not-so-silent-night neighbors.

Finally, the landscaping finish work. After digging up nearly the entire property, there was stone and gravel strewn everywhere. The most labor-intensive part of the whole project was gathering the stones by hand and rake. Many nights with a sore back, fingers, hands, and elbows.

It was so slow I ordered a mini York rake on Amazon, a time and body saving investment. By connecting it to a 2” adapter hitch, my riding lawnmower pulled it, doing a primary raking in no time that made successive hand raking far easier. Still, a monumental task to hand rake and collect small and medium stones across nearly an acre before re-seeding the torn up land. There were hundreds of glass fragments that came to the surface too, all hand picked to stave off blown tractor tires and bleeding feet. Just one exploded tire in spite of the booby traps.Vigilance and focus. 

By the time I finished the last day of August, I was pretty happy it wouldn’t drag on forever.

After the well company Manosh came in to install the pond water line from the house to the upper pond exiting over a small cascading rock fall, the connection made so much noise in the basement you could hear it throughout the house. 

Turns out the flow restrictor was the culprit and, after some trial and error, we realized the only way to silence that intense disruption was to bury the flow restrictor underground part way to the pond and get it out of the basement altogether. The excavator came in clutch as I dug up the line ever so gently to avoid clipping it or, more importantly, the buried electrical wire which had already gone in. If you have a stream you can tap into instead of using a high producing well, all the better.

The last frontier: water chemistry.

Here on the mountain there is a lot of iron. Ferrous (vs ferric) iron that materializes with oxidation. While the water is clear coming out of the tap or hose, once exposed to oxygen, here comes the rust. The top pond is an intense rust orange color which, no surprise, is tumbling into the middle pond. There is no easy fix for this well water conundrum, but the compromise solution first envisioned was to connect the well water line, which runs out of the house to the top pond, to the pre-existing house water filtration system. To avoid overloading the filtration system or have to pump many hundreds of dollars of salt bags into the salt filtration tank, fine tuning the volume of water that goes out to the ponds is the trick via both a timer (thank you Manosh, the wonderful well drilling and water company out of Morrisville, VT) and a ball joint handle to turn down the water volume. Otherwise re-bedding the water filtration media would be required much more frequently as it’s not designed for 24/7 volume. Balancing practicality and long term maintenance is the trick. After extensive research this week and calls with a couple of water purification companies, another more appealing solution: a single, 2.5 cubic ft 13"x 54" media tank of manganese called Terminox that repeatedly backwashes the media, requires no more electricity than an alarm clock, shouldn't require any significant maintenance, may not need rebedding for years, can handle up to 20 parts per million of iron and is free of hazmat chemicals (e.g. auxiliary potassium pergamanate tanks used with some of the green sand filtrations tanks). That goes online in October It will be great to see how well that baby works and how much residual ferrous iron remains in the upper two ponds or if it eventually cycles out. For now we have a beautiful red rocks waterfall and a tri-color set of water bodies, a colorful show competing with the red and orange maple leaf fall foliage.

It's been an amazing summer, with all the work completed solo in a blazing three months. The swimming is divine, aeration system perfect, a first mallards' visit, frogs loving it after moving in quicker than a whip and the solar pond lighting a sight to behold.

Another suprise, discovering that not just ducks love ponds;  here's the footprint of a black bear that cruised around the water one moonlit night. 

Next summer, aquatic plants including lillies and lotus.

Three pond books if you're thinking about digging: Building Natural Ponds by Robert Pavlis, How to Build a Farm Pond, Step by Step by Darrell Rhoades and How to Build Ponds and Waterfalls by Jeffrey Reid. 

If you have any questions on this real estate endeavor, would like to list your own home for sale or consider purchasing property anywhere in Vermont, let's connect via text or phone at 802-793-1515 or via email @ claytonpaul@maplesweet.com

Thank you so much for reading and a speciaal thank you to engineer Rob Townsend of the American Survey Company for his expertise and counsel, Ruth Robbins, the town zoning administrator for her permitting guidance and Andy Bombard and Chris Kathan of the town road crew who kept a close eye on things..

You've Got the Power.

EVs (electric vehicles) are everywhere. EV power stations multiply. Gasoline prices soar. 

Is your power bill high this month? Did your utility company really just jack the rates again? Don't the Mazda CX-90 plug in hybrid and the gorgeous Lucid Gravity coming in 2024 look tempting? Do you really want your power bill going up more than it is from nightly EV charging on top of that soothing hot tub?

Juice. Power. A basic need. The ultimate addiction.

30% federal solar incentive entices. Are you fired up to ride the carbon footprint reduction bandwagon?

Solar Power looks better than ever, even if the upfront costs can be intimidating.

Take a deep breath.

Even if the short term price per gallon will be astronomical, all in good time worshiper. In the long run you can beat the odds.

To take the plunge, reach out to solar providers to get cost estimates and placement options. Solar providers vary but in central Vermont a few to consider are Sun Common, Green Mountain Solar, & Catamount with prices reasonably consistent. These companies book up so plan on ample lead time.

Are you ok with a massive pole mounted solar panel array in your back yard to spoil your viewshed or do you have enough land to keep them out of sight? Do you have a cedar shingle roof (I have adored mine) and are you willing to pony up to have it replaced, trading romance and rusticity for modern? 

Can you handle the unknown risks of solar panels EMFs raining down through your roof into your bedroom? A super charged lovelife or a stunted libido? Are you willing to really roll the dice? 

EMFs. Hmmm.

Ok, to help get a handle on the risk, you can order the aptly translucent Ghost Meter for $38.95 and become a ghost busting EMF hunter. Cruise through your house to find EMF hot spots. Alarmingly, or suprisingly not, mine went ballistic within inches of my laptop, cell phone, bone conduction bluetooth headset, and airpods. No safe haven. Haven't even had the chance to check my smart meters yet as they are soon to land.

The devil seems to be everywhere and our fate (excepting the philistines among you) may already be sealed. We're already glowing.

I suppose every increment counts so I ordered the super appealing Faraday radiation shield guards to place over the smart meters. Check out my earlier expose on smart meters.

And ladies and gents, back yourselves up before it's too late.

Tesla Power Walls are a great alternative to shelling out $10k plus for a permanent propane fired Generac or Kohler whole house back-up generator. While tempting to purchase outright you can lease two powerwalls through Green Mountain Power for $55 a month for ten years or pay a single up-front $5,500 with GMP then responsible for any battery related issues during the lease vs being responsible yourself if you choose to purchase and leverage GMP's Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) program.

Having instant back-up power without interuption, not having to go out and start a mobile generator or worry when you're away is illuminating. And, word on the street, GMP leaves the twin batteries with you after the expiration of the ten year lease to enjoy back up for another five years at no additional cost. 

Depending on your exposure and usage, two power walls with storage capacity of 13.5 kwh each or 27 kwh combined will cover most homes for two days of an outage or four to five days if conserving. 

Having a back up gasoline or propane powered generator is still great, just in case of an unusually long power outtage. Old school redundancy to save the solar day.

GMP gets to farm your battery power during normal conditions and carefully avoids depleting your stored juice when inclement weather is expected so you're not left with low energy batteries during an outtage. 

18 panels, as of publishing, are running in the $24k range, 28 panels in the $34k range before the federal tax credits. Take into account electrician power upgrade costs not included in your solar estimate. While 100 amp service can fly for just the solar panels, most recommend upgrading to 200 amp service which makes for a more robust system and allows for faster EV Charging;  you'll definitely need 200 amp service if leasing the Tesla Power walls. 

When installing an EV or PHEV (Plug-In Hybrid EV), hardwiring your EV charger will allow for en extra 8 amps, or 48 amps provided a 60 amp circuit breaker is installed vs the NEMA plug in outlet (see photo at right) total of 40 amps. For PHEVs it may not make much of a difference but for EVs enjoy faster charging. Once hardwired a charging station is more permanent vs the NEMA outlet which allows owners to move or temporarily take their EV Charger away with them.

The level 2 chargers run between about $399 and $550 but GMP will give you one (technically lease you one that you'd have to return if you move out of the GMP service area) if you purchase an EV (but not a PHEV). A couple of level II Charger options are Emporia and Chargepoint and GMP offers Flow as a third option, provding what's in stock when you apply. See the GMP Rebate programs here.

The Mazda CX-90 PHEV will charge in two hours and twenty minutes on a level II vs about 11 hours out of a standard home outlet. A Tesla can take 8-12 hours even on a level 2 charger (as it's a pure EV with larger batteries). A 2023 Hyundai Ioniq 5 EV will charge to 80% between about six and seven hours on a level 2 charger.

If you buy a new EV (vs a charger) GMP refunds $2,200, $1,500 if used. If a PHEV, $1,000 new, $750 used.

As soon as you've installed your level 2 charger and have it connected to your wifi call your utlity provider. GMP can sign you up for their Rate 74 variable charging which brings the usual all day 18.9 cent per kilowatt hour rate down to 14.4 cents per kwh when charging after 9pm and before 1pm the next day M-F. This rate only applies to your EV charging, not the whole house which is a flat 18.9 or so cents per kwh rate. You can then program your charging window on your EV and or Level 2 charger app. Weekend ev charging rates are 14.4 cents/kwh all 24 hours.

If your dream is to be completely free of the shackles of an electric bill, wake up. GMP hits you with "Non-Bipassable" charges of between $27-$30 a month.

Net metering at the house keeps track of what you use and what you pump back onto the grid. Winter solar is far less powerful than spring through fall solar and most customers with systems sized for their average usage have the non-bipassable electric blls covered until about February, then paying some in March and April. By May, you'd generate more than you use and start banking net metering solar credits. If you system is oversized (always good to get as much as can afford) you shouldn't have any bills above and beyond the non-passable $30 or under monthly charge (until rates increase, usually in the 2-5% per year range). Owners that install in winter are unlikely to see much of a billing reduction until May. 

All told, the myriad aspects of going solar can be mystifying. This should get you started and hopefully be useful in deciding whether or not the time is right to get more than just a good sun tan.

Have you any related questions or is there anyting here that could use correcting or clarifying?

Thank you so much for your interest, for basking in the Maple Sweet sunshine and taking the time to connect.

Call 800-525-7965, text 802-793-1515, email info@maplesweet.com or visit www.maplesweet.com to set up showings or list your property anywhere in Vermont.

See all Maple Sweet Real Estate listings and the newest Vermont listings.

Referrals & recommendations are welcome & appreciated.

Vermont Mandatory Consumer Disclosure: please note Vermont  real estate agencies represent Sellers directly or indirectly. Buyer representation can be gained for properties not already listed by Maple Sweet Real Estate. To better understand the merits of or arrange for buyer representation, please email or call for further details.

Information Disclosure: information provided and relayed by Maple Sweet Real Estate is not represented to be accurate or free of errors. While substantial efforts are made to obtain and convey information from sources deemed dependable, Maple Sweet Real Estate does not guarantee or warranty such information is accurate or reliable. All information should be independently verified.

AI. It's all the rage. 

Take a deep dive by listening to this NYT podcast on the releases of artificial intelligence by Google's Bard and Microsoft's Bing and how ChatGPT has sparked a revolution you can now experiment with and that will affect us all.

   

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Microsoft Tech Officer Kevin Scott pull back the curtains in this fantastic podcast.

Obsession can strike out of the blue.

30 years ago my father gave me a cuckoo clock from the Black Forest of Germany. It sang for years before falling quiet. One thing lead to another and some of its parts went missing. After decades of separation, a long awaited reunion this summer when I had it shipped back from Japan. Repair seemed more than it would be worth so Frank Cole of Cole's Cuckoo Clocks in NH sold me one that was very close but not the doppelganger. Up it went straight away and the cuckoo bird sings again.

It really gets under your skin.

Each day, pulling down the chains to raise the cast iron pine cones to keep that tiny bird in song and the clock ticking. A new way of measuring your existence. Like a contagious virus (sound familiar?) I am hopelessly infected.

Started looking for spare parts for the original as the carving quality was that much nicer and found an identical cuckoo clock with the same nest and baby birds on pegs, just a lighter maple stain. A furious ebay auction in the final seconds and sweet victory over dozens of competing bidders. A cuckoo hatrick.

A successive Black Forest time piece discovered on amazon and a deeper dive into Triberg where they have been produced since the 1700s, Even avant garde cuckoo clocks are being made there today, much to the chagrin of the traditionalists.

Always game, my better half joined the hunt and chanced upon Guido Zimmerman, a graduate from the Academy of Visual Arts in Frankfurt. https://www.guidozimmermann.art/cuckoo-block-sculpture

Gorgeous architectural cuckoo clock kinetic sculpure, giving entirely new meaning to what has endured since the 1700s. Grenades instead of the cast iron pine cones. Whoa.

Our house up on the hill, as you might have guessed, is starting to sound more like an exotic aviary. Sweet insanity.

Real estate is the ultimate obsession. Feeling hungry for a new crib? Call 800-525-7965 or email info@maplesweet.com to put your own property on the market or start looking for something higher in the canopy.

Maple Sweet Real Estate covers all of Vermont. Visit www.maplesweet.com 

See the newest Vermont listings.

Referrals & recommendations are welcome & appreciated.

Vermont Mandatory Consumer Disclosure: please note Vermont  real estate agencies represent Sellers directly or indirectly. Buyer representation can be gained for properties not already listed by Maple Sweet Real Estate. To better understand the merits of or arrange for buyer representation, please email or call for further details.

Information Disclosure: information provided and relayed by Maple Sweet Real Estate is not represented to be accurate or free of errors. While substantial efforts are made to obtain and convey information from sources deemed dependable, Maple Sweet Real Estate does not guarantee or warranty such information is accurate or reliable. All information should be independently verified.

Change is a coming.

Landowners of 27 or more acres in Vermont have, since 1980, benefitted significantly from Vermont's Current Use Program and it's lower tax rate on land farmed or forests managed through judicious logging. It's estimated enrolled landowners save an average of 88%.

Rather than being taxed at residential rates, Current Use encourages conservation by incentivizing larger land owners with tax breaks, diluting the desire to subdivide and develop. Hugely popular, this Vermont program has helped keep our Green Mountains green, even if conditioned on farming or, more broadly, selective cutting management.

Compared with other states in the northeast, Vermont has precious little old growth forest. For anyone who has visited Muir Woods north of San Francisco, old growth forests are magical. But it's not just the beauty.

From a vtdigger.org article, “The science has made abundantly clear that wild forests store and sequester more carbon, on average, than managed forests,” said Jon Leibowitz, executive director of Northeast Wilderness Trust, one of the only groups in the Northeast that doesn’t allow logging on the land it conserves. “Science has also made abundantly clear that wild, old and complex forests harbor more biodiversity than young and managed forests.” 

Starting July 1st, 2023 and thanks to Rep. Amy Sheldon, D-Middlebury who introduced the Act 146 bill, H.697 and Governor Phil Scott who signed it into law in May of 2022, current use enrolled land owners can start submitting applications for their land to be consdered as the new managed forest sub-category, "Reserved Forestland". Those with less than 100 acres will need at least 50% of their land classfied as "significant or sensitive", the determining criteria,and those with 100 or more acres, at least 30%. Expanding on elligibility criteria such lots should:

1. Prevent timber management (steep slopes, etc.) and, or;

2. Provide a strong ecological (or appropriate historical/cultural) basis for managing for values other than sawtimber.

Just 1% of Vermont's 4.6 million forested acres are currently considered old growth; having more "wild" forest, especially as other states in the northeast have more old growth forests, is the target. After all, it's the unspoiled nature that most of us love about Vermont.

Here's the Vermont Dept of Forests, Park and Recreation page on Act 146. Standards are projected to be completed by the end of this year using an October, 2021 report as foundation. This January 14, 2022 Reserve Forestland Report Summary may be of interest. 15% of elligble UVA (Use Value Appraisal, another name for the Current Use Program) parcels are expected to qualify.

This VPR story is a good listen.

Fore any related questions, Keith Thompson, FPR Private Lands Program Manager keith.thompson@vermont.gov

Let it grow. The bears and moose will love it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Other notable Current Use updates over the last ten years:

Solar, 7.1.2021

The installation of a solar generation facility on land that is, in the aggregate, located on 0.1 acre or less, and which land otherwise qualifies for Current Use as agricultural land or open land (the latter of which shall qualify as managed forestland as per the Commissioner of Forest, Park and Recreation), shall not be considered development for the purposes of disqualification from Current Use.

Land Use Tax Calculation Change 10.2.2015

The Land Use Change Tax (LUCT) is changing from 20%/10% of the land withdrawn from the program based on a pro-rated value per acre to 10% of the fair market value of the actual parcel removed.

Management Plan Updates 2014

To keep a parcel eligible for enrollment, owners of managed forestland must submit a management plan update on or before April 1 of the year in which the plan expires. 

Wastewater Systems as Development & Non-Conservation Timber Cutting 2012 

The definition of “development” has been amended to provide that enrolled land is also considered developed – and therefore ineligible for continued enrollment – if a wastewater system permit has been issued for the land pursuant to 10 V.S.A. § 1973 and the Commissioner of Forests, Parks and Recreation has certified to the Director of Property Valuation and Review that the permit is contrary to a forest or conservation management plan or the minimum acceptable standards for forest management; use of the parcel would violate the conservation management standards; or after consulting with the Secretary of Agriculture, Food and Markets, the Commissioner certifies that the permit is not part of a farm operation. This replaces the legislation enacted last session regarding a broader group of permits, is retroactive to July 1, 2011 and applies only to wastewater permits issued after that date.

Several clarifying and technical amendments were made to the current use statutes, including that timber cutting contrary to a forest or conservation management plan during the remaining term of the plan or contrary to the minimum acceptable standards for forest management if the plan has expired will constitute development and that renewal plans must be filed no later than April 1 of the year in which the initial 10-year plan expires.

Maple Sweet Real Estate covers all of Vermont. Call 800-525-7965, text 802-793-1515, email info@maplesweet.com or visit www.maplesweet.com to set up showings, list your property, move into new digs or buy a much bigger piece.

See the newest Vermont listings.

Referrals & recommendations are welcome & appreciated.

Vermont Mandatory Consumer Disclosure: please note Vermont  real estate agencies represent Sellers directly or indirectly. Buyer representation can be gained for properties not already listed by Maple Sweet Real Estate. To better understand the merits of or arrange for buyer representation, please email or call for further details.

Information Disclosure: information provided and relayed by Maple Sweet Real Estate is not represented to be accurate or free of errors. While substantial efforts are made to obtain and convey information from sources deemed dependable, Maple Sweet Real Estate does not guarantee or warranty such information is accurate or reliable. All information should be independently verified.

Are you an epicurean? A foodie? The galloping gourmet?

Here's a story.

This text drops from AT&T saying I've wracked up over $100 in international calling and I may want to put on the brakes and look into it before destitution sets in. Right-O, you've got my attention.

Duly dilligent, the ever situationally present real estate broker I am, I get on the horn with AT&T. Gene answers in latino tinged english in a wonderfully polite and courteous manner. An hour later the international calling bill has been wiped, all praise AT&T, and we got to talking. The intrigue starts when he confirms, after I ask him where he is, that AT&T employees aren't allowed to disclose their location... Hmm, something to hide? But Gene starts dropping hints including that it's a former WW1 Spanish colony and, later, a WWII American colony. His accent is a ringer for a native spanish speaker so I start guessing and cite, one after the next from a list of former Spanish colonies an arm long. Missing with every guess. Gene drops another hint, East Asia. Really? And, behind door number three, the million dollar answer: the Phillipines.

Having spent nearly ten years in Asia without hopping across the Phillipino archipelago, I asked him what the most prized local dishes are and, after proudly naming a handful, he boasts that a Phillipine dish had been voted number one on the food atlas!

The food atlas? Now he really has me going. A quick google yields the Taste Atlas which I pull up and, Wow, Shazam, what a cool site if you adore making magic in the kitchen (or at least trying to), eating and travel. At this point that AT&T text announcing international call hemorrhaging is the best thing that's happened today. Yum!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Have flavor, have fun. Once you find a country to explore, you can click on each dish (and they multiply as you zoom in). One scrumptious looking dish from the Phillipines, for example, is Pancit. 

What a goldmine. And, as President Biden would say, here's the deal. What would your house be without a kitchen? A home without aromas and flavors? Vermont without maple syrup or Harbison Cheese from the Jasper Hill Farm?

 

 

 

 

 

Dreaming about a trip to Japan? I have been as the border has been closed to tourists since 2020. Here's your virtual ticket. Imagine biting into refreshing Yubari King Melon on a hot summer day in Hokkaido.                                           

 

 

 

 

Or sustaining grilled eel over hot rice with condiments from Nagoya known as Hitsumabushi.

What a glorious way to add value to your own home; surf the culinary planet without even leaving Vermont. Or book those airline tickets to take a much needed vacation and set your destination based on what you discover in the Taste Atlas. Bring the world to Vermont and add just what your real estate deserves, the exotic and mouth watering for a richer existence.

At Maple Sweet Real Estate the focus is on much more than dirt, steel and lumber.

Your palate and soul matter too.

Making our home here in the fertile Green Mountains is so sweet to begin with but having the world at our fingertips, just as Julia Child brought traditional french cuisine into the land of formica and Sunday afternoon football across 1950s televison sets, makes our paradise more colorful and adventurous.

Step aside Covid.

 

Here's an interactive feast for your eyes and inspiration for your butcher block. Whether just for you, your family or the next great dinner party, have fun exploring the Taste Atlas.

And if you're ready to buy a new house altogether, Maple Sweet Real Estate covers all of Vermont. Call 800-525-7965, text 802-793-1515, email info@maplesweet.com or visit www.maplesweet.com to set up showings or list your house and move into completely new digs to keep up with your culinary adventures.

See all Maple Sweet Real Estate listings and the newest Vermont listings.

Referrals & recommendations are welcome & appreciated.

Vermont Mandatory Consumer Disclosure: please note Vermont  real estate agencies represent Sellers directly or indirectly. Buyer representation can be gained for properties not already listed by Maple Sweet Real Estate. To better understand the merits of or arrange for buyer representation, please email or call for further details.

Information Disclosure: information provided and relayed by Maple Sweet Real Estate is not represented to be accurate or free of errors. While substantial efforts are made to obtain and convey information from sources deemed dependable, Maple Sweet Real Estate does not guarantee or warranty such information is accurate or reliable. All information should be independently verified.

US President Joseph Biden has signed, among the barrage of executive orders, an extension of the Eviction Moratorium through at least March 31st, allowing federally-backed mortgage forbearance applications continuance. Landlords all over the country groaned, some deciding to sell and relieve themselves of the associated complications, other savvy investors on the swoop for good investments to come on the market and tenants struggling to pay rent at once relieved and concerned that overstaying their welcome could result in serious consequences for them and their credit well beyond Covid. Nearly one in five tenants is as per the US Census Bureau, now behind 

The moratorium, instituted at the end of 2020 and to have expired at the end of January, is part of Biden's ambitious $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan.

The original CARES act was signed in March of 2020 and as per NOLO: 

"The Order protects tenants who:

• have used their best efforts to obtain government assistance for housing
• are unable to pay their full rent due to a substantial loss of income
• are making their best efforts to make timely partial payments of rent, and
• would become homeless or have to move into a shared living setting if they were to be evicted.

In addition to the above requirements, one of the following financial criteria must apply. To qualify for protection, tenants must:

• expect to earn no more than $99,000 (individuals) or $198,000 (filing joint tax return) in 2020
• not have been required to report any income to the IRS in 2019, or
• have received an Economic Impact Payment (stimulus check) pursuant to Section 2201 of the CARES Act."

Facing an estimated $70 billion in back rent nationwide, tenants faced February evictions, the plan allocated by late January $25 billion for up to 12 months of any past-due rent, future rent, utility bills, or other housing costs for low- and moderate-income households “who have lost jobs are or are out of the labor market." or otherwise prove financial hardship due to the pandemic. Household income is limited to no more than 80% of the median

income for your area. Vermont median income was approximately $63,001 in 2019. The longer it takes for financially stressed tenants to their aid applications, the longer it will take for their landlords to get paid and those tenants may end up facing evicition if that's not done in time. Important to consider: the moratorium doesn't prevent evictions, it just postpones them.

Doug Bibby, the National Multi-Family Housing Council President last year adroitly pointed out that "An eviction moratorium will ultimately harm the very people it aims to help by making it impossible for housing providers, particularly small owners, to meet their financial obligations and continue to provide shelter to their residents" and called for related property owner assistance. Here's some great info on the Vermont Residential Housing Stabilization Program including info on the Landlord Economic Assistanct Program. 

Landlords have bee very natively affected too in some cases and civil courts have been closed leading to massive backlogs. Some lessors are evicting finding other reasons such as selling drugs on the property or posing a threat to other people or property. Here's a font of eviction related info from the Vermont Judiciary to review including information for both tenants and landlords. Every case is unique and consulting a real estate attorney experienced in evictions for expert kowledge is recommended. Vermont's Legal Help Website outlines eviction process steps here including info on Vermont law S.333 staying evictions. Landlords may not:

• start an eviction solely for non-payment of rent or other fees or charges
• charge any late fees or penalties for late payments of rent, or
• give a 30-day notice to vacate for any reason

As Sir Captain Tom Moore, the wonderful British centarian that died of Covid this week put it in this great interview with soccer star David Beckham, "Things are bad but they will get better, they always have got better and don't feel too miserable about it."

An amazing recovery is already in it's infancy with increasing Covid vaccination dissemination and falling Covid rates: the light is finally at the end of the tunnel which will bring sunshine into everyone's lives as well as reducing vacancies, evictions, non-payment of rent and an improvement in tentant welffare leading to an increase in home ownership. From this great tragedy is bound to come an incredible revival. It's a wonderful time with still historically low interest rates to invest in rental properties, multi-families or a single family home for yourselves.

Maple Sweet Real Estate is bullish on Vermont and so appreciates serving you, your family and broader network, delving deeply into myriad issues affecting Vermont property owners, sellers, and purchasers.

Connect to maplesweet.com, e-mail info@maplesweet.com or call toll-free 1-800-525-7965 for info on selling or purchasing Vermont commercial properties, homes, condos or land or to get more information on Vermont real estate. 

See all Maple Sweet Real Estate listings and the newest Vermont listings.

Referrals & recommendations are welcome & appreciated.

Vermont Mandatory Consumer Disclosure: please note Vermont  real estate agencies represent Sellers directly or indirectly. Buyer representation can be gained for properties not already listed by Maple Sweet Real Estate. To better understand the merits of or arrange for buyer representation, please email or call for further details.

Information Disclosure: information provided and relayed by Maple Sweet Real Estate is not represented to be accurate or free of errors. While substantial efforts are made to obtain and convey information from sources deemed dependable, Maple Sweet Real Estate does not guarantee or warranty such information is accurate or reliable. All information should be independently verified.

Living in the country is something I have always cherished and, from a very young age, believed so much better than congested urban sprawl. Both my parents chose large cities from Caracas, Venezuela to Manhattan in New York. The money, culture, restaurants, the enticements everywhere, copious and seductive.

The crowds though, the crowds. Stifling. When I lived in Tokyo the train operators pushed the sandwiched subway riders into the cars with white gloves, over-capacity. The smog and pollution were so intense I could barely breathe, suffering from asthma attacks and serial medication just to get by, tortuous. Eventually I got smart and fled for the hills.

In Japan it was Hokkaido, the northern frontier of flowers and beets, fly fishing and skiing, hot springs and lavender instead of museums and traffic jams. Things got better immediately. The dramatic alpine vistas and clean air made you feel as if you were reborn.

A pandemic magnifies all that and changes everything. As if toxic urban existence were not enough to wake up even the most avid urbanite, enter Novel Corona, or Covid-19.

All our lives have been transformed in ways unimaginable just a few months ago. City dwellers across the land are re-evaluating their decisions to live in highly congested urban and sub-urban neighborhoods where Covid-19 has spread like wildfire with over-taxed hospitals and over-burdened morgues in its wake. None of us have been able to look at any news source for over a month without the dreaded virus dominating .

As in most tragedy, the magic is in the silver lining. Here in the Mad River Valley or anywhere in Vermont, while partially or fully restrained from usual performance, what better opportunity than to dive deeply into and embrace country living?

A long-held dream of raising hogs became realizable; what could be better than your own home raised pork which must be, at least the Chinese would concur, the finest meat on the planet? From bacon to braised ribs to juicy pork chops, even better than chickens, as wondrous as eggs and the 5:30 a.m. crowing rooster are. 

On top of a new culinary adventure, how about the challenge of constructing, start to finish, a tiny home?

While hopefully at least a few practiced hands or carpenters are reading this, most of you have varying skillset levels for DIY projects. No stranger to the hammer or chainsaw, this seemed an exciting challenge. With just a few minutes of online pig pen research, the solution availed itself.

 

 

 

Pallets. Wooden pallets like those cast away behind the big box stores and lumber yards. The same day I found a used pallet supplier less than an hour away and had, in no time flat, 15 wooden pallets stacked in the yard.

Sometimes the simplest things are all you need. And anyone can do it.

A few eight-foot pressure treated posts laid down on field stone later the foundation was born, stacking and screwing in each of four pallets to form the sub-floor to be covered with thick cut boards for support. Two pallets for each of the side and rear walls stacked on end, another for a half front face, the remaining pallets cut diagonally for the upper walls and one whole for a front deck in front of a gate door. A couple of cross beams and ceiling rafters for roof support, blue foam insulation to prevent the pigs' heat from condensing and raining down on them and their hay crib and finally two eight foot corrugated sheets as roofing attached with rubber washer sheet metal screws.

Tiny house, major pleasure.

 

 

 

Once the walls go up the one-inch thick boards go down on the floor, a combination of spruce and reclaimed planks, followed by diagonal braces in three interior corners for structural reinforcement. 

The most enjoyable part of the pen construction was, and as my friend and very talented artist Cathy Stevens-Pratt would say, bringing art into everyday life.

To frost the cake, Core 10 metal sheathing constitutes the exterior baseboard, amazing as it rusts and with age forms an evolving patina, one of the few construction materials that improves rather than degenerates over time.

While cutting the Core 10 for the first time with a Dremel and tiny metal circular saws, it came to me.

I used a few of the metal sheets overlapped and cut out a hog stencil to adorn the new digs and announce to the passerby what this new crib would house.  The same Dremel tool used to divide the sheathing is perfect for cutting out the stencil which I mounted on wooden boards about 3/4" thick. Both stencil and stencil cut out were mounted and used on both the side and the pig pen front door. Would hogs ever have it so good?

As with most construction, you won't be surprised if it takes longer than you expect but most great undertakings do and working with your hands, in contrast to typing endlessly in front of computer screen, is active and a wonderful  form of meditation. The only other critical tools are the Makita Magnesium 7 1/4 inch circular saw which cuts and rips like butter and a Makita power drill for all the screws, which lend strength compared to nails.

The white band you see on the door and around the structure is a single layer of PVC clapboard, made of the same material as pvc pipe which is water resistant and a great material to use for window and door trim compared to wood which rots much more quickly.

The gate door, the inner diagonal braces, stone to fill the foundation walls, not to mention the stenciling, electric fencing and water-on-demand hydration, one thing leads to the other. While not completed yet, the project was begun a couple of weeks ago and is nearly wrapped with two Duroc-Yorkshire piglets arriving in May at $100 a head.

While you haven't likely dreamed of forking out a pig pen (remember when Judy Garland as Dorothy takes a tumble into the pig pen in the Wizard of Oz) or the likely enticing smells they'll generate, there is so much to love about living in the country.

Vermont has it all. What better time to escape the concrete jungle permanently or purchase a home or camp in Vermont as a sure escape in case another pandemic, or worse, strikes? My inbox and phone have been inundated with potential buyers who have realized just that and now truly understand what a safe haven Vermont can be, on top of the gorgeous mountains and streams.

Raising pigs and chickens are this Vermont real estate broker's Covid-19 silver lining. 

What is your silver lining? Can a pandemic translate into something exciting and new, bring you to a safer place and open up a whole new world?

Vermont has been under lockdown, in various forms, since March 25th with social distancing the mantra, children home from schools and university, remote learning, virtual meetings via zoom, and many strapped and unable to work at all or come even close to being as productive as usual. Vermont realtors were, for almost four weeks, unable to show any homes.

Finally, Monday of last week, the 20th of April, guidelines loosened slightly allowing showings only to people living in Vermont or out-of-staters that have quarantined in Vermont for 14 days which, for all intents and purposes, rules out showings to any out of state buyers except those with homes here that can leave their home state for more than two weeks just to see some houses up here which is, to say the least, asking a lot of them and far from any reasonable measure. There is talk of the levee breaking June 15th from which Vermont Inns, short term rentals and B&B ops have been tentatively approved by Governor Scott, still over six weeks away. Herculean efforts are underway to bring the state government to more reasonable conclusions to allow showings sooner to out-of-state buyers with Covid-19 precautions in place.

It's a fantastic time to start exploring Vermont's real estate market in earnest and scheduling showings for June 15th if you're out of state without means to quarantine in Vermont yet or right away if here already or have come from out-of-state and have quarantined for 14 days already. Demand is building and many in the northeast and far beyond are eyeing this gorgeous place and preparing to buy up property here to help ensure they have access to this incredible escape. Already, many second homeowners have ditched their cities and are working remotely here full time. All over the world rural migration is reversing decades of urban migration. In today's New York Times, this story spotlights Peru where highways are full of pedestrians, suitcases and children in an exodus from Lima. What a fabulous change. Exodus, the painting below depicted by artist Robert Spencer in oil, captures the spirit of freedom and promise rural life offers.

Now is the time to move to the country or at least purchase a place to have in addition to your city dwelling. This it. To get information on any Vermont property or real estate, call 800-525-7965 or email info@maplesweet.com and we can accelerate the process towards making your dream come true. You can also text me at 802-793-1515. Thank you so much for the opportunity to serve you, always such a pleasure.

Maple Sweet Real Estate delves deeply into myriad issues for Vermont property owners, sellers, and purchasers.

Connect to maplesweet.com, e-mail info@maplesweet.com or call toll-free 1-800-525-7965 for info on selling or purchasing Vermont commercial properties, homes, condos or land or to get more information on Vermont real estate. 

See all Maple Sweet Real Estate listings and the newest Vermont listings.

Referrals & recommendations are welcome & appreciated.

Vermont Mandatory Consumer Disclosure: please note Vermont real estate agencies represent Sellers directly or indirectly. Buyer representation can be gained for properties not already listed by Maple Sweet Real Estate. To better understand the merits of or arrange for buyer representation, please email or call for further details.

Information Disclosure: information provided and relayed by Maple Sweet Real Estate is not represented to be accurate or free of errors. While substantial efforts are made to obtain and convey information from sources deemed dependable, Maple Sweet Real Estate does not guarantee or warranty such information is accurate or reliable. All information should be independently verified. 

IMPORTANT NOTICE: Never trust wiring instructions sent via email. Cyber criminals are hacking email accounts and sending emails with fake wiring instructions. These emails are convincing and sophisticated. Always independently confirm wiring instructions in person or via a telephone call to a trusted and verified phone number. Never wire money without double-checking that the wiring instructions are correct.

 

The Ikon Pass. The Ski Travel Revolution.

The writing was on the wall when Vail Resorts forked over $41 million for Stowe in 2016. We here in the not-a-single-stop-light Mad River Valley felt the tremor and when Sugarbush owner Winthrop Smith, formerly of Merril Lynch Pierce Fenner and Smith started talking about industry take overs and hopping planes out west...  The news of the sale of Sugarbush to Alterra Mountain Company, pending regulatory approval, in January of 2020, has broken.

Epic, really. The excitement was born when the Epic Pass began back in 1992, taking real flight in 2012 and expanding the resorts list agressively forward including Vail Resorts 2016 purchase of Stowe.

Sugarbush will be part of this formidable ski area collective across the planet, bringing an infusion of new blood from far and wide, reinvigorating our tiny little corner of paradise and introducing this magical place.

Brush up on your international languages and bring your google translate on the lift. Here comes some serious fun which will lead to all kinds of adventure and international exchange that will boost area property values and raise the bar for what our provincial localvore culture is called on to serve up. Gone will be mundane menus limited to hamburgers and french fries. Bring on the poutine, confit du canard, unagi and kangaroo steaks. Internationalization, one planet, one love. Today the Ikon pass includes over 40 destinations from California to Chile, Europe, Australia, New Zealnd, and Japan, the one upmanship yielding so much treasure. Niseko, part of the Ikon pass, is even closer to my heart as I lived in Hokkaido for nearly ten years. Sapporo is a wonderful city to visit and a spring board to the island's stunning hot springs. The Epic pass recently added the 10 Hakuba Valley resorts into its fold.

Compare platforms: Sugarbush has major bragging rights. Ikon is the stunner with better graphics and better tech relative to archaic looking Epic.

But Vail Resorts, as anyone who's skied the back bowls at Vail, is a heavy hitter. Having gone to school in Boulder in the early 80's, Vail was mind blowing. They've expanded since the early 60's when Pete Seibert and Earl Eaton, Aspen ski guides, founded the mountain, with Vail going public in 1997 before the Gillet Holdings bankruptcy and when Leon Black of Apollo Managment took over. 37 ski resorts in the US, Canada and Australia including Vermont resorts Mount Snow, Okemo and Stowe. Here's the comprehensive Wikipedia lineup:

Name	Location	Date opened	Date acquired	Notes	Citations
Vail Ski Resort	Eagle County, Colorado	1962	N/A	The third-largest ski resort in the United States.
Beaver Creek Resort	Near Avon, Colorado	1980-81	N/A
Breckenridge Ski Resort	Breckenridge, Colorado	December 16, 1961	1996		[7]
Keystone Resort	Keystone, Colorado	November 21, 1970	1996
Heavenly Mountain Resort	Lake Tahoe	December 15, 1955[8]	2002
Northstar California	Placer County, California	December 1972	October 25, 2010		[9]
Kirkwood Mountain Resort	Kirkwood, California		February 22, 2012		[10]
Afton Alps	Denmark Township, Washington County, Minnesota		December 6, 2012		[11]
Mount Brighton	Brighton, Michigan	1960	December 6, 2012		[11]
Canyons Resort	Park City, Utah	1968	May 29, 2013	Acquired on a 50-year lease.	[12]
Park City Mountain Resort	Park City, Utah	December 21, 1963	September 11, 2014	In 2015, Vail merged the Park City and Canyons resorts under the Park City Mountain Resort name, connecting them with a gondola.	[13][14]
Perisher Ski Resort	Perisher Valley, Australia	1951	March 30, 2015.	Vail's first Australian property.
Wilmot Mountain	Kenosha County, Wisconsin	1938	January 19, 2016
Whistler Blackcomb	Whistler, British Columbia, Canada	January 1966	August 8, 2016	Purchased 75% interest in Whistler & Blackcomb Partnerships (balance owned by Nippon Cable)
Stowe Mountain Resort	Stowe, Vermont	1933	February 21, 2017	Vail's first resort on the East Coast of the United States.	[15]
Mount Sunapee Resort	Newbury, New Hampshire		September 27, 2018[16]	Owned by State of NH but operated alongside Okemo, first resort in New Hampshire to be operated by Vail	[17]
Okemo Mountain Resort	Ludlow, Vermont		September 27, 2018[18]	Purchased alongside Mount Sunapee.
Crested Butte Mountain Resort	Crested Butte, Colorado		September 27, 2018[19]	Purchased with Mt. Sunapee, Stevens Pass, and Okemo.	[17]
Stevens Pass	Stevens Pass, Washington		June 4, 2018	Purchased alongside Mount Sunapee, and Okemo.
Falls Creek	Bogong High Plains, Victoria, Australia	1946	February 22, 2019.	Bought from Merlin Entertainments along with Hotham.
Hotham Alpine Resort	Mount Hotham, Victoria, Australia	1925	February 22, 2019.	Bought from Merlin Entertainments along with Falls Creek.
Mount Snow	Dover, Vermont	1954	September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.
Hunter Mountain	Hunter, New York		September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.
Attitash Mountain	New Hampshire		September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.
Crotched Mountain	New Hampshire		September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.
Wildcat Mountain Ski Area	New Hampshire	1933	September 24, 2019.	Wildcat trail cut by CCC in 1933. Original gondola started operation in 1958. Peak Resorts acquired Wildcat in 2010.
Liberty Mountain Resort	Carroll Valley, Pennsylvania	1960	September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.
Roundtop Mountain Resort	Pennsylvania	1964	September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.
Whitetail Resort	Pennsylvania		September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.
Jack Frost	Pennsylvania		September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.
Big Boulder	Pennsylvania		September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.
Alpine Valley	Ohio		September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.
Boston Mills	Ohio		September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.
Brandywine	Ohio		September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.
Mad River Mountain	Ohio		September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.
Hidden Valley	Missouri		September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.
Snow Creek	Weston, Missouri	1986	September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.
Paoli Peaks	Paoli Township, Indiana		September 24, 2019.	Bought from Peak Resorts along with 16 other mountains.

Alterra, also headquartered in Colorado (Rocky Mountain High), is backed by the Crown Family, among America's wealthiest families worth, according to Forbes, $8.8 billion, The Crown Family owns Aspen Skiing Company and, with very deep pockets, puts a lot of muscle into Alterra. 94 year old Lester Crown is founder Henry Crown's son. From a humble start in building supplies provision including (are you listening local excavators?) sand and gravel. Henry and his brothers learned early on on how to leverage borrowed money, evenutally taking control of General Dynamics.

Kate Tracy wrote this put a smile on your face 5280 Mile High Magazine expose on how the ski conglomerate war is tearing her love live apart. Who would have ever thought?

Feeling social? Here are Ikon and Epic on facebook. 

Hey. This is serious. Territorial competition has fallout. Deborah London, in a November 9 tweet: 

"EPIC SKI PASS TRYING TO STEAL $699 from me. They want to renew my pass automatically but they removed Arapahoe basin from the pass and never notified me-hmmm, I don’t know anybody that likes to pay for something that they’re not getting, do you?

I used to ski Arapahoe Basin, or A Basin (this year added to the Ikon Pass in a shrewd chess move) while a student in Boulder and adored it. There was this massive cornice to drop off, the closest I'd ever come to being an eagle.

What a coup for Ikon. What a coup for Sugarbush. What a coup for Win Smith, on top of the Mountain Collective pass option, another great ski the world vehicle providing two days each at plus 50% off additional days at Alta, Aspen Snowmass, Arapahoe Basin, Banff Sunshine, Big Sky, Coronet Peak/The Remarkables, Jackson Hole, Lake Louise, Mammoth Mountain, Mt. Buller, Niseko United (Japan), Revelstoke, Snowbird, Squaw Valley Alpine Meadows, Sugarbush, Taos, Thredbo, and Valle Nevado (Chile). Global Affiliate resorts include Chamonix (France). It gets better and better.

What do you know about this pending acquisition and what are you thinking about it? Post your comments and let us know.

On the other hand if all you're interested in is expanding or moving your footprint, call us to either list and sell your own Vermont property or set up showings to pick up a house or two, or a ski area if you're really feeling ambitious.

Ad Astra.

Connect to maplesweet.com, e-mail info@maplesweet.com or call toll-free 1-800-525-7965 for info on selling or purchasing Vermont commercial properties, homes, condos or land or to get more information on Vermont real estate. 

See all Maple Sweet Real Estate listings and the newest Vermont listings.

Referrals & recommendations are welcome & appreciated.

Vermont Mandatory Consumer Disclosure: please note Vermont  real estate agencies represent Sellers directly or indirectly. Buyer representation can be gained for properties not already listed by Maple Sweet Real Estate. To better understand the merits of or arrange for buyer representation, please email or call for further details.

Information Disclosure: information provided and relayed by Maple Sweet Real Estate is not represented to be accurate or free of errors. While substantial efforts are made to obtain and convey information from sources deemed dependable, Maple Sweet Real Estate does not guarantee or warranty such information is accurate or reliable. All information should be independently verified.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Clarity. Purity. Divine. Water. 

So many run for the hills to the gorgeous Vermont Green Mountains in part to escape Babylon, the concrete jungle and all that congestion brings including crowds and pollution. Vermont is a utopia, far from the Madding Crowd where you can hear the coy dogs howl in summer, listen to the silence of snow falling, and swim in pristine rivers and some of the best swimming holes on the planet, sip the drops off the melting icicles in winter.

We exalt in our drinking water. My last log cabin in paradise shared a spring with five or so other homes, all drawing from the same overflowing bubby underground water supply framed by a rudimentary concrete tile (large vertical pipe), running across the fields of azure through a plastic hose that the beavers would seek out and nibble through in a primal attempt to start a new beaver dam, another story entirely. That spring water was some of the most delicious I've ever tasted. 

In Northfield there's a famous spring with a spigot by the side or Route 12A that many flock to with their containers, just off the Dog River, providing drinking water to connoisseurs from near and far. We are fortunate in so many ways in Vermont chief of them perhaps is our abundance of water, seeping up through the ground across the land forming wetlands, springs, bogs, mush back yards, itinerant springs and often in abundance. Yes, our mountains are very green and in we're in no danger of running dry anytime soon even if some wells aren't consistent producers or have gone bone dry in drought.

Yet all is not golden in Lala land. Even the most delectible water can have impurties, chief of which are the bacteria e-coli and coliform, the two basic scoundrels property inspectors test for when purchasing a house up here.

Shocking isn't it?

And shocking is usually the tonic called for. Primitive really, dumping a gallon or more, or less, right into your well to chase off the villains interrupting that soothing perception of perfect paradise. Mom knew what she was doing in the laundry room with Clorox, bleach in essence, purifying those whites, kicking out the stains and disinfecting the family germs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's a link to the State of Vermont Instructions on how to disinfect your water that may be helpful, though it's advisable to hire a professional water purification company to do the honors including re-testing.

Reshocking at higher concentrations and or allowing a longer sitting period before flushing can bring redemption but even reshocking can fail. In those unusual but far from rare cases, it's the big guns that get brought to the table. 

Enter Ultraviolet Light filtration which one water purification company rep this week confidently guarantees clean retest results 99.9% of the time. This week I received an estimate, including installation, @ about $1,600. Compare that to shocking which might run in the $350 to $450 range, isn't guaranteed, and is likely to be a recurring tool in the fight for bacteria free water. UV systems do require maintenance and service and replacing the UV bulb, depending on manufacturer guidelines, may be part of that regimen. These sleek powerhouses zap the bacteria but don't filter out other impurities including pernicious radon in water (absolutely worth testing for as it's a major carcinogen) which is more commonly treated with carbon filtration depending on concentration levels.

Helping to keep you safe and healthy is a major concern at Maple Sweet Real Estate as there is almost always more than meets the eye. Having an experienced professional at your side can mean the difference between health and illness and means much more than having just valuable comparative property value insight. You are the most important part of your home and safeguarding you and your is paramount. The key to your health. 

For more information on health in your home, water purification company recommendations, or on any facet of buying or selling real estate, you're most welcome to call me on my cell at 802-793-1515 or reach me at claytonpaul@maplesweet.com 

If you are an expert in the field of water, it would be fantastic to hear from you to help fine tune the information above.

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