Real Estate Search Blog

For buyers interested in real estate in Harvard Square, finding available Harvard Square properties can be difficult. The area owes is popularity to its unique restaurants, bars, and shops, frequent cultural events, movie theaters, and accessibility to the Charles River. Countless businesses call Harvard Square home, including the real estate office of Hammond Residential.

Cambridge real estate agent Charles Cherney of Hammond Real Estate has created a website for those looking for Harvard Square real estate at HarvardSquareProperties.com. Rather than digging through MLS listings, potential buyers can visit the Harvard Square Properties website to find a full list of frequently updated Harvard Square real estate listings.

As a Harvard graduate, resident of Cambridge, and real estate agent based in the heart of Harvard Square, Charles Cherney is the best resource for potential buyers seeking Harvard Square properties. No one knows Harvard Square and its properties better than Charles Cherney.

The current housing market presents an excellent opportunity to collect secondary income from a dirt-cheap investment property, especially within Fall River real estate. Our recent article titled “Investment Properties of Fall River Real Estate” spotlights several multi-family homes in Fall River that are under $200,000. Ezine articles are a great resource for first-time real estate investors. On the Ezine articles website, we found some helpful tips on managing property in Fall River MA, written by someone who has managed property for over 20 years. We’ve paraphrased Carol Gibson’s words below:

• Know (and Keep Updated on) Local Ordinances and State Laws
• Be Ethical and Honest
• Have Good Communication Skills
• Have Good Computer Skills
• Be Patient and Have a Sense of Humor
• Be an Excellent Follow-Up Person

There are hundreds of resources for property management on the web. Another option is to hire someone to manage your property for you.

There is an extremely helpful Boston Globe article offering loan-securing tips for new and seasoned home buyers. Buying Boston real estate and Massachusetts real estate in general is not as hard as many think it is.

• First-time buyers have plenty of options when it comes to securing a loan. The homebuyer tax credit is a good example that even extends to repeat buyers. Conventional loans for relatively smaller mortgages, which can be secured for as low as 3% down, are another example.
• Veterans, surviving spouses, and active duty members can secure a loan for 0% down.
• Massresources.org offers 30 and 40 year mortgages for 3% down. There are income requirements but they are not nearly as strict as Section 8 housing restrictions.
• Bostonhomecenter.com is a great resource for people looking for similar programs catered to Boston real estate.
• Contact your town or city offices to find out if there are additional programs available for your use.

For more great resources on Boston real estate, visit Prudential Prime Properties on the web.

Thanks to top Cambridge real estate agent Charles Cherney of Hammond Real Estate, several homes in Cambridge can now be explored on YouTube! By visiting the Cambridge For Sale Channel on YouTube, you can watch Charles Cherney’s videos of properties in Cambridge MA. Click the yellow “Subscribe” button to receive notifications when Charles uploads new videos.

How to get to the Cambridge For Sale Channel on YouTube:

www.CambridgeVideos.com

www.CambridgeChannel.com

www.CambridgeForSaleChannel.com

www.YouTube.com/CambridgeForSale

To learn about all the active MLS real estate listings in Cambridge, visit www.CharlesCherney.com and log in as a new visitor on the home page.

The town of Newburyport MA (part of Cape Ann real estate) is becoming one of the trendiest places to live in Massachusetts. Here are a few “in” things:

• Organic food and live food restaurants. Two just opened in Downtown Newburyport.
• Open spaces. This summer,  the Newburyport Redevelopment Authority announced its plan to turn a 3-acre site into a waterfront park with a playground, sculpture park, and performance space.
• Historical sites. Butler’s Toothpick, a 19^th-century navigational marker, got a new look this summer.
• Citizens gearing up to help nonprofits. Pennies for Poverty, 2 Cents 4 Change, the Salvation Army, the Masons and the Rotary Club, the Anna Jaques Hospital Aid Association and the Roof Over Head Collaborative are just a few organizations which Newburyport residents actively participate in.

If you’d like more information about Newburyport real estate or Cape Ann real estate as a whole, visit http://capeannrealestate.com/ where you can find expert advice from Rosemary Quarato, an experienced Cape Ann real estate agent.

Walking around a new city can only show you so much. For a little guidance, there’s a new tool provided by HGTV.com that can help you see all that Newton real estate has to offer before you hit the streets.

HGTV’s Frontdoor.com provides a user-friendly guide to your future city, condensing information from sources such as City-Data.com, Yelp.com, and Eventful. With this tool, you can easily get to know the basics about your new city by visiting one website instead of several.

As shown above, click the “Reviews” tab to be shown a list of the most frequently reviewed businesses on Yelp.com. This is great because Yelp.com can be extremely helpful for residents who know the area, but a bit confusing for someone who doesn’t know Rialto from McDonald’s. A person new to the area can see what his new town is known for. The “Explore” tab allows users to choose a point of interest, like “Schools,” and a map shows pinpoints of all local schools. There are many more helpful facets to this tool, which you can explore for yourself here.

For a more in-depth analysis on Newton real estate and all that it has to offer, visit Christine Norcross and Partners online. Find out if relocating to Newton would be a good choice for you and your family, and browse the homes for sale in Newton and in the surrounding towns.

If you’re looking to buy real estate in Cambridge or you’re simply new to the city, there are plenty of ways to get to know the neighborhood. “Explore the Neighborhood” is a great tool on HGTV’s Frontdoor.com that allows users to virtually explore their city. Below is a screenshot of the tool.

By using the menu bar to the right of the map, you can choose what you’d like the map to show you. For example, if you just bought a home on Harvard Street and you’d like to see if there are schools nearby, check off the “Schools” box and the map will show your pinpoints of all schools in Cambridge. Because the map is powered by Google, you can zoom in to view residential street names.

For more detailed information about the Cambridge area, visit CharlesCherney.com. Charles Cherney is a top Cambridge real estate agent who has years of experience assisting buyers and sellers of homes in Cambridge. If you are a student or working professional who is thinking of relocating to Cambridge, take the first step by visiting CharlesCherney.com.

The above penthouse studio condo is located at 1091 Boylston Street in Boston’s Back Bay. Living here would put you steps away from some of the swankiest shops in Boston on Newbury Street. A thriving neighborhood, Newbury Street and the Back Bay are stocked with the city’s most cutting edge restaurants and bars. This condo is ideal for a college student (it’s located directly across from Berklee College of Music), or as an investment property.

For more details on this listing, visit Prudential Prime Properties online. While you’re there, browse the MLS listings of other properties in Boston real estate. For expert guidance on real estate in Boston and all that relocating to Boston has to offer, Prudential Prime Properties will be able to answer all of your questions.

You know you need to remodel your bathroom, but you have no idea where to start. Home improvement magazines can sometimes overwhelm with dozens of expensive accessories. Where do you go for help?

A bathroom on www.remodelingmyspace.com

Remodelingmyspace.com is an excellent home improvement resource full of photos and videos of real-life home improvement projects created by ordinary people. Start with the photo galleries for ideas, then use the videos and how-to articles to help you begin the project.

If you’re computer-savvy, make sure to check out Google Sketch-Up, a FREE program designed to help you create 3D models. Imagine creating a 3D model of the new addition you plan to build onto your home!

If you’re planning on selling your home or are looking at homes for sale in Boston or the surrounding area, talk to the experts at Prudential Prime Properties. They are a full service Boston real estate agency specializing in Downtown real estate in Boston and relocation to Boston, Back Bay, Beacon Hill, North End, South Boston, South End, Leather District, Seaport, Waterfront, Charlestown, Watertown, Cambridge and Greater Boston homes for sale.

Before the recession, the phrase “house poor” was adopted into the average home buyer’s vocabulary, as buyers hesitated to spend every last penny of their life savings on a down payment for a dream home. To go beyond the “house poor” consideration is to prevent oneself from also becoming “Maintenance poor.”

Marketwatch.com recently published an interesting article for home hunters on how to financially prepare to buy a house in these shaky economic times. To become “Maintenance poor” is to purchase a home unaware of its necessary future repairs with the fatal error of not having enough in the bank to cover these costs.

The article advises house hunters to save at least 1 to 3 percent of a property’s purchase price for major maintenance costs and unexpected expenses. As for mortgage payments, these days buyers should have 6 months of payments saved in the bank because of the wavering job market. For basic repairs like painting and caulking, anyone buying a typical starter home budget $500 to $1,000 a year.

If you’re a home buyer looking at homes in Newton, Natick, Needham, Wellesley, Brookline, and Weston, the top real estate agents of the area are Christine Norcross and Partners. Browse the Homes by Norcross website for Newton listings, and feel free to contact Christine Norcross and Partners if you have any question about Newton real estate or about a particular property.