Shop local Saturday happens once a  year on the Saturday after Thanksgiving. Of course it's always good to shop local as it keeps tax dollars, good and services in your community and helps local vendors stay in business.   But why not making it "Shop Local Every Day?"  After all, we could all get into the habit that way and the benefits would explode!  My Thanksgiving holiday is spent in Ames, Iowa, visiting my daughter and her family.  It's a treat and an annual tradition to shop local on the Saturday after Thanksgiving.  One of our stops included Dog Eared Books, which was founded by 2 moms  who opened up the book store in downtown Ames, Iowa.  They are a former journalist and a teacher who both love books and dogs.  One of the owners handed me a sack for my leftovers from lunch, smil... 11/27/2021

    I was showing a property in Story City Iowa last week and decided to talk a short drive across the intestate and check out where I went to school in Roland Iowa and then venture to see a home I lived in for 3 years of my childhood.  I found my way to the countryside and found the home, the creek we used to swim and fish in and the home I lived in.  It was kind of fun going by and remembering the fun we had in the barns and fields the creative ways we made fun out of just about anything.  It is funny what I thought was a big hill wasn't has big as I thought or the long bike rides we road were not half as long as I remembered.  I guess when you are young things seem larger than they are.  As far as the home?  Still there they added on a garage and painted the home.  The buildings?  Lo... 01/09/2011

There has been a lot of confusion surrounding how mobile homes play into the first-time buyer tax credit. For the first several months after the tax credit was announced, I heard conflicting information from a variety of national real estate and tax experts. Several said that a mobile home owner could buy a house and get the credit. They touted the line of reasoning that many of us in the industry first expected would hold the answer; since a mobile home is not real property, the owners would be considered first-time buyers and could claim the credit. However, when I had a personal contact in this exact situation ask me if they would qualify, I wasn't willing to take the word of an unknown author or even a single CPA. I decided to do some checking on my own and get it straight from the ... 09/25/2009

I think the current NAR TV commercial with the family sitting on the fence - asking "What are we waiting for?" is the message we should keep sending. I realize ALL REAL ESTATE IS LOCAL, but it would be nice if the national media talked a bit more about how the historially low interest rates, the fact that banks CAN still loan money, and the great selection of homes, make it a perfect time to buy! I'm very thankful to be in Ames, Iowa where our job and real estate market is stable. That's one great thing about living in the midwest! 01/28/2009

December was a good month for the Ames housing market even with the seasonal fluctuations in the real estate market with the holidays and Iowa snowfalls and cold temperatures. The supply of inventory continues to be low (10.3% lower than 2007 and 25% lower than 2006), and the number of pending sales remaining strong with 22 homes going off the market as a pending status in December. The listing supply (period of time needed to clear the housing market inventory) has gone from 15 months (2007) down to 11 months (2008) for Ames area for the month of December. The increase of sales is contributes to the affordable housing and financing that is available for buyers. Sellers have had to become more competitive with price and condition of their homes than in the past few years. A positive not... 01/17/2009