 Good afternoon. I'm Austin Davis director of government affairs with the Lake Champlain Chamber your friendly local regional chamber of commerce with a knack for nurturing prosperity in our local economy and This particular live at 25 525 broadcast. We're gonna be talking about housing and to talk about housing I brought on Troy Bachman who is the director of the Northwest Vermont Realdors Association and She is really just if you want to talk for an expert on our Regions of housing you could find no better person at this point in time But you know, I don't think unless you're living under a rock It's not hard to see that there's some issues around housing in our region and at the chamber we speak with many businesses every day and it's really noticeable that it's the limiting Factor and most of our economic endeavors and it really every pursuit You know, it's it's issues of staffing in our health care systems and other essential services it's preventing growth of Some businesses and you know, we're seeing a lot of incredible things in our regional economy despite this However, we could do much better and we need to do much better So I'm really happy to have Troy on the program here today to talk a little bit about You know the state of play and and some things we can look forward to but thanks for joining Why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself and the organization? Sure. So thanks for having me on as Austin mentioned my name is Troy Bachman. I am the CEO of the Northwest Vermont Realtor Association We are a trade association representing Realtors, we've got about 700 members and We our service area is Chittenden Franklin and Grand Isle County. So most of our realtors Are serving that area of course many of them do business throughout the state And we are a part of a broader coalition of realtors across the nation So our focus is really Training for our members education and allowing them to provide the best service to clients And with that that requires some understanding of our market and what's happening with that So glad to talk dive in and talk about you know a little bit. What's happening if you want to go into that Yeah, you sent me a really enlightening report a day or a couple days ago when we decided we're gonna set this up and Yeah, just tell me a little bit about that And this is something you're doing on a regular basis and yeah Provide some great insight into what's happening in our market. Sure. So I'm gonna plug the Vermont Association of Realtors They provide amazing market statistics for us through a firm called Domus analytics and this is available for all of our real-term members so one of the reports that we see on Is about the median sales price and we're always kind of looking at that and we all know anecdotally that Housing prices are going up Wages maybe not matching that and that can be really challenging. So right now we see the median sales price across Vermont for all types of properties so condos land single family all types of Residential properties is about three hundred seventy five thousand dollars now when we zoom in on just Chittenden County That number goes up Which is not surprising like we're one of the biggest Metropolitan areas in Vermont and the median sales price in August 23 was five hundred thirty four thousand dollars And that was just for single family homes. So We can see and and the graph you're seeing on our screen is tracking the median sales price Over time so you can see like there are some dips every now and then and that's natural with any type of free market But we can see that that's going up and up and up Which has led to a lot of concern about how Vermonters are going to afford housing Certainly, and it's not as if it's an easy time and we're all seeing inflation across the board not just in housing either way at wages and We're at a time when student loans are resuming payment You know, what are some other factors at play for folks? Yeah, I mean the pandemic caused sort of a nominal influx of people into Vermont other things at play is a historic shortage of building supply And that's not just from the most recent sort of pandemic issues But that stems all the way back to 2008 like the initial great recession the initial great recession The recession as if there were only one the one in 2008 You know the housing industry kind of screeched to a halt for a while in terms of building. So we're already working from a Stunted supply And so I you know, it's not just a Vermont issue. It's a nationwide issue so yeah, we've got the inflation we've got student loans a lack of supply and then Contributing to our supply issues of courses act 250. Yeah. Yeah, I was gonna say so there's there's obviously some things that are Specific to Vermont too. We have a 50 year old land use policy that hasn't seen much in the way of updates Throughout its time. It was created at a time when we didn't have an agency of natural resources and very little local planning and zoning So it had a certainly had a purpose at that time We've only added to it ever since and so I think that's something we'll probably want to get into a little bit about Some chances to reform it. We also have a really old housing stock in this state Can you talk a little bit more about that? I certainly live in one of those old houses. Yeah I mean I I live in a house from what 1905 and again that kind of stems from The the challenges in development the labor shortages of like finding people to work on your house If you can't do it yourself Yeah, we have it definitely have an aging housing stock and again we can kind of look at some of the regulations and you know That's not the only reason but it certainly doesn't help in trying to generate new supply And then another factor Again, we see this nationwide, but specifically in Vermont is we have an old older population And people are living longer more independently Staying in their home staying in their homes longer And especially if you've locked in a 2.5 interest rate or maybe you've paid off your house Maybe you you don't have a mortgage payment at all. There's not a lot of incentive to move right now and downsized Because that's an issue that we see as well of like we do have an older person maybe looking to to downsize But where are they going? They don't have properties to downsize to yeah, we really do have an issue with Housing at the entry and exit point of the market You know, there it's there folks who are older who are in Larger homes that could probably be more suitable to young families. They might be empty nesters at this point they're in retirement and You know there as you said probably paid off the margin but not but It's hard to find something that actually makes sense for them if they're gonna sell this home to then put what equity They have in that and have some extra for retirement You know that price that you put on the screen there 425 sure they could sell their home But where are they gonna move to where are they gonna move to yeah, that is the question on everybody's mind And I know for our members a lot of people are having to kind of get creative with the housing options that they're helping people find like More and more we're seeing people young families by multi-family Like duplexes and quad flexes when they can find them and renting out part of that and that's a wonderful option and that middle housing point of like It's not necessarily a single-family home But it's not a big apartment complex is something that I think our market could really use more of And it's all it's already all through the downtown area like we already see it And I think sometimes there's like resistance to the idea of let's put some some duplexes or some quad flexes But that already exists. It's just old And there's nothing wrong. I don't think with building more of that Well, it's a great place for a great opportunity for the young professionals in the state to start building some equity and cementing some roots here two things that I think are very difficult for this generation, especially with a Older population or state Yeah Yeah, I mean I I'm sure it's no surprise to anybody watching this. I'm not from around here. I'm from the south. I was I moved up last summer And part of the conversation you alluded to this in that your opening was like My association had we I had to work remotely for a while while I tried to find housing and with a aging population and Inflation increasing and causing the dollar to go further Taxpayers are often on the hook for that. So our nice all the nice services we get for our taxpayer dollars We need more people here. Yeah in order to keep the tax burden where it is as opposed to increasing that And I think that's an important point. I mean I think much of our conversation around Development of new housing in our state has consistently been one about growth and an underlying idea that growth is bad And I think we're at a point where Especially because we've suppressed growth for so many years You know, we need we absolutely need growth without growth. We're gonna collapse We're not, you know, right now one in five or mattresses over 65. It's coming soon to one in four and You know, you're not gonna have the The hospital staff the emergency staff that you know the folks who can work on these old houses If we don't do something and do something soon and then also We're not gonna have the tax base to support all the services these older folks need so growth is necessary and You know, we're not seeing new units come online. I think you had some data on that too Or you know Yeah, I can talk about the month of supply. Sorry So right now our market has About two point one month supply of inventory, which means it would take two 2.1 months for us to sell anything residential that is on the market That doesn't account for new construction. That's like what is existing but the Sort of thought of a healthy market depending on like where you are in the nation is anywhere from Like a healthy housing market has four to six months at least on the market and the numbers aren't lying like we've only got two months Which can be kind of scary, right? Because if you've got if you're a realtor or you're someone looking for a house It feels very Nerve-racking to be like, okay, well, this is what we have There's probably not anything new coming on in the next, you know, 24 hours or whatever. So there's it the pressure on first-time home buyers The pressure on people looking to find Something a little different for their housing needs is really high and it really is all housing needs, too You know really what we're talking about is when we're at that level of inventory Just slowing down all turnover and all churn in the market, right? And so, you know, we're even talking about our folks who are unhoused in our state And I think actually our state treasurer will give them credit where credit's due. He had this fantastic webinar not long ago And the title of it was based off of a book whose author he came on in You know homelessness is a housing problem, which I think is is something that's Extremely lost on a lot of individuals in this current debate. Yeah I mean and we can't forget the connection that homelessness has with like general poverty and again, we're seeing this is a wage issue as well of like We've got a shortage of people to fill jobs. We've got a shortage of Again it just all comes back to like we do need people here, but the problem is we have nowhere to put them Yes, and the big question is how are we gonna solve that issue? Which you know you and I talk a lot about this but like we're not gonna build our way out of it There's gonna have to be some other reforms to support the market Other than just like the solution is not Build new housing like that is not the end all be all solution. It has to be one piece of the puzzle Yeah, so let's talk. Let's talk about Reforms of our our housing. I mean, I think you know, we touched on act 250 a while back and in the earlier in the conversation And what we found is you know, this is a land use law that has Stymie growth for 50 years and to a large extent has kind of Accomplish what it's out to not do which is create sprawl And I think you know for me when I think about the epitome of that It comes down to what's called the 10-5-5 rule. Can you tell us a little bit more about that? Sure so the 10-5-5 rule is a portion of The legislation that says you can't you can only build 10 houses within five years within five miles of each other So when you think about like a traditional suburban neighborhood, that's typically more than 10 houses and We don't have a lot of those here and it's not necessarily houses. It's like 10 units So I know there was a proposal to bump that number up to 25 and I don't know if you want to talk a little bit about how that played out But you know, I think that was really scary for a lot of folks, you know and I think we we ended up, you know, getting something across the finish line lads that are processes last session that Allowed to go to 25 or 24 in limited areas we're talking about 0.5% of the states overall landmass and I think we need to go much bigger and bolder than that if we're gonna start hitting our targets You know and you think about that from an incentive perspective and when you say You can't do more than 10 units within five years within five miles You know unless and you're automatically going into active 50 if you don't and You know active 50 is notorious for adding additional time Energy and cost so I was looking into this a little bit as someone sort of new to the area within the last year or so And I found There was a number granted. This is from 2017. So many years old at this point in terms of the rate of inflation But it said that an active 50 review process could add up to if not more than $50,000 to the cost of the home And that prices out So many people, you know, like especially with the interest rates that we're seeing right now like the $50,000 extra dollars is the difference between I mean, I'm not I'm not the mathematician But that is that's like a significant difference in your monthly mortgage and your down payment like in your tax bill You know, I think anyone has ever bought a home can tell you the difference between, you know What that $50,000 can make? Yeah, and you know, that certainly just gets rolled into the overall long-term price of Rental units too. And so all of it, you know, does go back to this But back to my incentives point, you know, if you know that you might be adding $50,000 per unit On this project, you're gonna try to avoid that you're gonna try to get it look that market rate lower And so what you're telling a developer is Tell you what build nine units and Then maybe wait five years and then we'll talk and we'll talk again or Go five miles down the road So, you know what we've really seen and I think you know, you talked to a lot of I remember I was working this at the Center for Research of Vermont many years ago and One study they did was they asked for monitors, you know describe sprawl I was gonna ask you is like I feel like we need to define what that is because We know what that is but for the purposes of this conversation like put a definition on it Yeah, and the funny thing was a lot of folks once they define sprawl They'd be asked is sprawl is your community sprawling and a lot of the folks in these are our local communities would say no And then they'd kind of go back and say well by your definition We do have sprawl and I think I think that it's these little Pockets of acreage that provide, you know, the agrarian feeling lifestyle that folks move to Vermont for many folks do That doesn't necessarily feel like sprawl But when you take a larger step back you realize, you know, my My home on a dirt road the end of another dirt road is is contributing to the sprawl at the end of the day Well and an important factor of all this too is like active 50 My understanding correct me if I'm wrong was designed with some environmental concerns in mind And sprawl is not environmentally friendly, right? Like if you're in a community if you live at the end of a dirt road, you have to get in a car and Drive Wherever you're going you're not necessarily taking public transportation You're not walking to the grocery store. That's 15 miles away, right? So you're Contributing to your carbon footprint goes up and I mean I would argue that sprawl has a big factor in carbon emissions, right because we You you got to have a car. Yeah, and I think it goes back to you know And then on the other side of things it's expensive develop in our downtown. Sure That's where the majority of the regulatory burden is A lot of the sites in our downtowns are need to be some kind of remediated They might they're brownfields, which means at one point in time There was some kind of contamination in that soil. So you need to mitigate that before you ever start and It is difficult to actually build our downtowns and that leads back to each of our organizations respectively long-term goal, which is removing some of these downtowns From act 250 jurisdiction the ones that have shown that they have rigorous Regulatory environments that can handle the work of act 250 the work that wasn't done by any municipality when activity is created They can handle it and they can do it at a local level which Ironically is a bit of a Vermont value, but we don't allow it often So, yeah, I mean I think I'm excited to see a couple of studies that are going on There's and I'm curious what your thoughts of walking at the progression, but currently right now due to a bill that passed last year act 47 there are four separate studies going on and I Orage anyone watching to to plug into these the natural resources board is undertaking a study and They're looking at So many factors. I don't think it's worth listing But what they're coming out to is is in what it might look like is a tiered system where communities based off the place based off of their regulation our municipalities are there are Gonna see different levels of review We might actually be able to see Downtowns like Burlington be able to do their own review and operate on their own Still acknowledging all the criteria and whatnot of active 50 but doing it as their local level And then I think there's gonna be some areas in the state that will likely look a lot like Active 50 currently is with some revisions and then I think there will be some areas in the state that folks will actually increase jurisdictional thresholds and Ironically those are areas that active 50 was always meant to protect and maybe didn't do the best job protecting You know some of these places in more vulnerable areas. We're talking about really about 18% of the state So that's a really exciting kind of component of how that the natural resources boards using their time and then There's a designation study which if I believe the website is Designation2050.org you want to take a look at that? We can post that in the description of this video. There's a Summit next week on Tuesday if and there's some other opportunities to engage but this is about the designation programs for different cities and towns across the state that allow for revitalization and tax credits for things like you know mixed-use development and flood mitigation which is very very on the tip of our tongues this this session I mean this summer and you know They're looking at how do they make those designations have a little bit more of How can we look at places like Burlington and say okay, you know actually the fact that they've achieved this designation Means that maybe they don't need active 50 or places like Winooski. That's had Tremendous fantastic smart growth over the last few years. It's a really opportunity city for Vermont And then you know the other two things Kind of stopping so long-winded about it, but it's just some advanced planning I was gonna you know, I'll jump in and say that While I don't think a Lot of the consequences of the regulation that we have currently were intentional We are gonna have to be Extremely intentional with how we rectify our issues. Yeah We're gonna have to take these studies and do something with the information Because you see I mean you see this all the time of like, okay. Well, like let's get some information Let's get some data on that great and then it gets kind of pushed down Right and I think that's it's so important to like take okay. Yes, we know this is an issue We now have the numbers to prove that this is an issue Let's be very intentional with how we do this in an inclusive way That provides more access for people who've traditionally been knocked out of the housing market and I think that's What's exciting about some of the work that's been mandated this last session for the Vermont Association of Planners and development agencies and What they're looking at is mapping the state which you know, I think is always kind of one of the original Goals under activity that just kind of got forgotten. You know, it was one of those like a big piece of legislation easy to forget Yeah, I mean, it was one of those things was is always the intention But it should be easy to look at a map somewhere and say Okay, these are volatile areas. These are sensitive ecological areas don't touch them. These are areas that have stormwater and sewer water and Fantastic electrical utilities and public transit. These are places we should put development and once we have some of that like, you know inventorying of our resources as a state my hope is We can have more educated conversations and we can actually make much of this conversation Place oriented and realistic and its expectations So you can kind of see all these three studies that I mentioned are all kind of braiding together and the hope is that you know Before December even we have a nice idea of how they've all braided together And we can use the work of the planners and developing agencies And we can use the work of the existing designation programs and how folks want to re-envision that and then pull that into how the Natural Resources Board wants to handle Some locations and we can start to have it so that we can build more housing in the places that needs to be Yeah, and I think it's important to remember and to remind our bike ourselves and everyone Nobody wants us to build lock stock and barrel No holds barred wherever you want to build you can build like nobody wants that right Well, somebody probably does want that They're not on this show But I think it's important to like in the concept of there's gonna be new housing near my house What does that mean for traffic? What does that mean for? The crowding at my grocery store. What does that mean for my daily life? What does that mean for my backyard? What does that mean for my backyard? And I we need more people not to be a total cornball, but like we need more people to say yes I want this here because it does Have benefit for everyone and living in that community living in a community that is more connected is is good for people We our association did a polling project and it wasn't in Chittenden County. It was in Franklin and Grand Isle where we asked registered voters about their preferences and you know what type of housing do you want to see developed and It was clear that there was there's tension between like yes I see that housing cost and housing availability is an issue But I don't want it here. Yeah, and I think that's a big barrier Especially in the active 50 process because of the public comment and public review Yeah, and really, you know, I think the thing we even hit on here is the active 50 does create this Just war of attrition. It's about how long can you drag it out? But the longer you drag it out the more you're at and costs. Yeah, because you know with enough Time and patience most people can get at what point do you give at what point do you give up though? You know if you face barriers, well, I think I think the issue with active 50 when we talk to legislators is There's there is that question of like what point do you give up? And it's you know that people point to their oh, we don't see many people give up most active 50 permits Goed through to completion and it's like at what cost literally that was the thing I was gonna say it was at the second side of that is Who never tried because they've seen that cost They've seen that time and energy expended and they said not worth it. And if you're a developer I think another you know speaking of cost I don't have the hard data on this but I would assume that if you were a developer Looking at okay. I can build 24. Let's just say we bump it up to 25 55 I can build 24 units That's gonna change how you cost your materials. It's gonna change how you cost your contractors like it does The buy-in book mentality is not always the best, but it does have I mean it is it is part of the conversation you know of Okay, but if I had to start at nine take a pause Do nine again like it's yeah, I think that's a well We're coming we're coming up at two minutes And so I want to get your final thoughts, but I want to put a finer point on what we were kind of just getting at and that is You know what we need is Vermonters to start looking at the current housing situation with a less myopic lens and what we need folks to look at is That we do need some growth. We have Push back growth to try to stay to our agrarian bucolic roots as long as possible However, it's where the point of emergency We're not gonna have the nurses and doctors or the EMT's or firefighters the teachers or the teachers And the baristas and or the servers or anybody we're not gonna have them if we don't do something and do something soon and you know, we need everyone to start looking at it that way and You know, if you would like to plug into these efforts My email is just austinvermott.org and I don't know if you want to share yours Sure, mine is Troy at nwbt realtor.org and Certainly want to plug you in reach out to your legislators. Let them know that housing is an issue of concern for you And that you want to be a welcoming state a state that says come here Do great things Join our community Because to say no to housing is to say no to new Vermonters at the end of the day So anything else you want to leave us with It's been a fantastic that really you said it better than better than I can but yeah, I'll just give a plug for Definitely it is important to be engaged with all aspects of your community and at this point Broad housing goals is what builds our community Right. We want people to feel included here and you know, that's something I certainly love about vermont That's something that made vermont really attractive to me and my family was It seems like a welcoming place and so let's make that true with our housing And you've got to engage with your legislators and kind of keep keep an eye on that And uh, that's that's probably what I would say Nothing says you're welcome here like a healthy housing You know, that's exactly right. Let's change our slogan Let's leave it at that for today. Again, I'm Austin Davis with the Lake Champlain Chamber And thank you Troy for joining for this And uh, have a great evening folks