The motivations of why people want to relocate to Vermont are many and varied. As a real estate professional, I keep my eyes and ears open to understand what it is about Vermont that attracts buyers. Certainly there are trends that tend to be cyclical in nature. A review of skiing in Vermont and the ownership of a second home in a ski community has had many ups and downs of the last 40 years. Dependency on nature providing sufficient snow morphed into dependence on snow making, traditional skiing attendance was hugely added to with the advent of snowboarding, and improved roads, snow removal and 4 wheel drive vehicles made access far easier.
If there is a single phrase that defines why people choose to move to Vermont, it is "quality of life". For those of us living here full time, we tend to take for granted many basic elements that the rest of the world is finding in short supply. Clean air, plentiful water, low crime and strong sense of community create the environment that attracts people to Vermont. But over the last 15 years, there have been added incentives. We have seen a tremendous amount of people moving to Vermont to participate in the "locavore" movement. The prospect of growing your own produce, boiling your own maple sap into syrup and raising animals has great appeal. The amount of cheese producers, microbreweries, and now even distilleries has grown at an astonishing rate. This has been a boom for agricultural properties.
The latest trend that I am seeing is a strong reaction to the obvious changes taking place world wide due to climate change. I have in the last two months had three international inquiries about properties that started with questions about water. Vermont is blessed to have such an abundance of water, natural resources and the legislative laws to protect them. The weather patterns of the last few years have demonstrated that our world is indeed changing and more people are looking to places that can and will adapt to those changes easily. I have always looked at Vermont as the perfect place to live and the changes that we are facing is proving that point to more and more people every day. I am experiencing a dramatic increase in inquiries, showings and sales over the last year that I can fully attribute to growing concerns about climate change and its impact on our environment. Vermont is viewed as a very desirable place to live in these changing times and the real estate industry of Vermont is responding.
Posted by Wade I. Treadway
