Category: Maine Homes

Why Does It Take So Long To Foreclose On A House In Maine?

You see it, the house in Maine with no one home, the grass hay field high, idling waiting for real estate foreclosure.

Seasons come, go and you wonder why does it take so long to foreclose on a house in Maine?

Welcome To Maine. You’re Here. You Made It! Affordable Housing In Maine Happens.

The news headlines squawk loudly our country is desperate for affordable housing.

Building materials costs are going up up up while despair grows for young first-time home buyers needing a place of their own to raise a Maine family.

We all want the state’s population to grow and where is everyone going to live?

So the light bulb comes on. If new construction is not meeting the housing demand because too expensive. If your average local Maine home buyer cannot afford the monthly mortgage payments.

What about foreclosure homes in Maine to ease the kink in the hose of affordable housing?

Tapping into the steady crop of empty Maine foreclosure homes to recycle them into affordable housing stock?

Small Maine Towns Have Smaller Priced Affordable Housing. Less For More.

The sooner the better too.

Because lack of winter heat, no power for the early spring water run off sump pump. Then years of hot summer sun blistering the peeling paint, fall leaves piling up and rotting.

Wild animals moving in and doing destruction. The broken window where the bird came in and lays on the living room rug without a proper burial.

And please, don’t open that refrigerator left fully loaded two years ago when the power got cut off for lack of payment.

Along with the heaping cat boxes, the house is empty and stuck in time, waiting for the slowly moving wheels of foreclosure justice.

A couple years vacant with the front door wide open and no one home. Just the home owner left. Everything else ran sacked crying for a 30 year dumpster. No water works draining attempted, the furnace is kaput.

The longer empty, the harder the rehab to “bring it all home” as Johnny Cash would hum.

But still, if better sooner than later, the Maine foreclosure home could be rescued, it’s win win.

Enjoying Maine’s Four Seasons And Working Remotely Online. Welcome To Maine Live Here, Work Globally Option.

For the new proud Maine real estate tax paying homeowner, for the community where you need affordable housing.

Foreclosures on Maine homes take a long time.

By law, the homeowner has to be 120 days behind on monthly mortgage payments before foreclosure action can begin.

Courts everywhere are back logged and out of state lenders are out of the loop on what’s happening to the collateral for a house loan good or bad. Lots of distressed mortgage loan inventory across the country makes it just one more delinquent property to herd through the judicial process.

Why else do foreclosures take so long on a house in Maine?

Someone is living there. Not paying rent but clinging, handing on despite the last call pleas to leave. Refusing to move despite the deputy sheriff eviction notices.

What’s the hurry? Hold your horses. Knowing it can take up to nine months or longer to finally get a judge’s eviction judgement to stick.

Best Location To Build Your New Maine House Is? Depends On Which Part Of The Life Movie You Are In Today.

(Often the keys for cash route is the quickest way to “help” the home owner or renter to pick up the pace and move along).

What else slows down the house foreclosure process? Divorce, bankruptcy all combined with eviction mixed together with the foreclosure legal proceedings. The wheels of justice are expensive and slow moving as the foreclosure winds slowly through the court system.

Mortgage loan modification, mediation, events like COVID can all “pause” the foreclosure process unless a short sale, deed in lieu of foreclosure remedy happens.

And when a bank does get the foreclosed property back in their REO inventory of non-performing loan units, more delay.

Getting bids for the trash out, changing locks, boarding up broken windows, yard work to cut up fallen tree limbs and reclaiming the shaggy tall lawn.

Seasons change as the empty unloved, unheated neglected Maine home deteriorates and slides further downhill into decay.

House Building, Your Maine Home Design Can Help Or Hurt Total Costs. Adjust, Pivot And Be Ready To Rethink The Construction Variables.

Eventually a licensed Maine real estate agent or appraiser roams through the property making notes on a clipboard.

Bids for repairs or sold pretty much as is, where is. It’s like real estate triage for this particular Maine local market.

Not one size fits all on how to approach getting the foreclosure back into the real estate market housing inventory.

Many need more than DIY skills and rehab loans are more lengthy but rewarding to see a house on the brink of disaster pulled back from being

smashed down and loaded into a dump truck to be hauled away.

Those house lots look like missing teeth in a Maine community.

The what should the bank or government agency list the property for number is arrived at and getting the foreclosure on the market happens.

Maine Outdoor Winter Snow Does Not Hamper The Farm Yard Animals. They Adapt, Expect The Season Change And Make It Work For Them.

When the bank that made the loan is in Maine, the pulling it back out of the fire can be sped up because everything is local.

The circles are smaller, a few phone calls or emails can make such a difference.

Local Maine bank lenders works best all the way around for a slew of reasons.

Local Bank Lenders Work Best In Small Rural Maine Real Estate Markets. – Mooers Realty

The house in Maine where the owner skips town and it’s left empty.

No tenant to use tear gas to remove (I mean serve them with evictions paperwork and start navigating through the legal court process).

What Happens When Grubs Move Into The Neighborhood. Your Lawn Gets Damaged, Pecked, Rolled Back.

Doesn’t the bank lender care or even know payments are not being made?

Big out of state banks have so many foreclosures, are spread all over creation with many departments. Reachable at five and six digit extensions. But good luck tracking down who you need to talk to at the bank or whoever bought up the block of non-performing foreclosure mortgage loans.

It’s like a rudderless ship. No captain, lost at sea and years can fly by that way. So better loan making to reduce the risk of foreclosure. Using local mortgage lenders that are a much bigger help than far away lenders with no connection to the community, county, state.

The foreclosure process eats up a lot of time because it’s a lawsuit with courtrooms, lawyers, judges are involved.

But if less foreclosures happened with tighter local lending underwriting guidelines reforms? Providing more creative loss mitigations options, streamlining the legal process.

And if local banks in the area jumped in to help speed up the foreclosure through short sales.

To incentivize quick bank home sales to quickly return affordable housing stock to the market.

Maine Small Town Living, Nothing Compares.

Then foreclosure houses would not stay off line so long and be in better shape to re-cycle. To ease some of the demand for affordable housing.

These days, smart Maine municipalities are speeding up foreclosure on tax acquired properties.

The Maine towns need the cash to fill potholes, pave and snowplow roads, fund education, pay for salaries and infrastructure building repairs.

The lien placed on a Maine home delinquent in real estate tax payments is a ticking bomb. Set to go off and detonate starting eighteen months with no taxes paid and a lien goes on the house title.

Baxter State Park, Hiking Mt Katahdin In Piscataquis County Maine.

The lot, structures become the towns at the end of at least three years of no paid property taxes.

Instead of waiting another year or two or three after that hoping the owner can redeem, those foreclosed properties are now being marketed online and sold to new performing taxpayers.

To get them off the books and tax generating again.

With empty unheated, unoccupied houses, the sooner the better works best.

Like a patient on the operating table, the longer he or she lies there the odds of survival lessen not improve.

The solution to speed up the Maine house mortgage loan or delinquent real estate tax foreclosure process?

Attack the problem from a local level. Maine banks making the original loan have mortgage centers in Vacationland.

Deed in lieu of foreclosure, debt to Maine Care for nursing home debt and delinquent real estate taxes can be debt with locally way way faster than many states and time zones away.

Those Maine foreclosure houses can be the answer to easing affordable housing inventory for folks begging to stop renting, start building ownership equity in their own place.

If the Maine house foreclosure takes 370 days to settle, another 180 days to sell, that is eating up a lot of time. That the Maine house suffers from poor weather and neglect, maybe even vandalism when no one is home. Local remedies to speed up the Maine house foreclosure process are in place.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North Street Houlton Maine 04730 USA

March 30, 2026
Maine House Building, The Home Plans Today

Maine house building, the home plans today.

The approach to house building in Maine, what home plans consider today that has changed. This blog post is about the new housing starts in Maine and the trends I am seeing as a real estate broker.

It’s no secret the Maine housing inventory of existing homes is pretty ravaged and picked thin. Finding a quality house or even rental these days is difficult. Because Maine is in the top ten destinations for part time second vacation homes purchases and full time relocation. So buying Maine land, building new housing is picking up popularity.

Bring the outdoors inside is more important than ever in housing design floor plans used building a Maine home.

House Plans, Building A Home In Maine. What To Consider. Want Open Concept Cathedral Living Space With Walls Of Glass?

So the approach to house building today in Maine.

What I am also seeing is smaller square footage and cathedral open spaces. Combing the living areas into one large opening with plenty of south facing glass. That is a common approach to home construction in Maine. Or if the budget is very tight, a lot of home buyers in retirement mode are opting for a small simple Amish building. Pre fab one room and you can combine more than one for “wings”.

Old New England farmhouses like Victorian era Maine homes were a tad on the large size.

Had to have a double, triple helping of living space because of family sizes. The grandparents living out back in an add on “L”. Often the young newlyweds housed in this small apartment and simply changing places with the aging in place parents. Generous sized homestead kitchens to have elbow room around the table and for home grown living off the land meals.

Maine House Building, Bringing The Outdoors Inside. Cathedral Open Concept Living Space Popular Today.

Since the 1940’s on the kitchen seems to have shrunk from the original New England Farmstead and Victorian rambler.

The formal dining room replaced with an area beyond the kitchen space. It seems your home is still your castle but running the roads more means the formal dining room used a couple times a year is a waste of space. I am seeing much larger kitchen areas, breakfast nooks and way more cabinets in today’s house compared to yesteryear housing stock.

Recycling centers, less wasted hall space and more cathedral or vaulted ceilings. More home office den space and with the cathedral open space, more small cozy corners.

The foundations on new Maine house building is often crawl space and even a concrete slab.

To hold down building costs and to aim for everything on one floor. It is cheaper to go up or make living space down below if there is a dry walk out daylight basement. Side hill Maine land listings with a gentle slope are being picked to tuck the new house into the level to rolling landscape. A view often helps new Maine house builders decide which piece of land acreage to select.

Your Kitchen Is An Area, Not A Room In Many Open Concept Living House Plans Today.

In the days when immigrants traveled to the New World to begin a new life, the living quarters were small and cramped.

Often up over a storefront or shop. Working long hours, learning the new language and customs and making the housing not the primary concern. The business was the master and space to peddle a product or provide a service mattered most. COVID made new Maine home builders ask first about Internet connectivity at this, this and that location.

Being on a cheaper electrical utility provider is on the list of questions unless the Maine house will be off grid and making their own juice.

House Plans Today, More Open Living And Combing Spaces With Lots Of Light. Formal Dining Rooms Are Missing In Many New Maine House Plans. Just Not Used.

Do you only consider resale of the new construction Maine house or what the heck.

Let’s make it the latest, greatest and a statement of the people who are going to live here. Often money is always in the equation to whittle away at the grand plans building a house in Maine. Is a bank pushing for completion before a closing and the end of a construction loan phase?

Or is the Maine house a build as you go DIY affair? Where the people in the weather tight but not nearly complete house don’t mind a table saw set up in the living room.

Maine Homes, Gotta To Have An Outside Porch, Plenty Of Bathrooms And Open Space Today!

Waiting for a sale on materials building a new Maine home.

Doing as much as you can yourself to contain the labor costs. Repurposing from other houses if lucky enough to glean an oldie goldie Maine home before the excavator engine starts up for the demolition. I see cabinets, staircases, stained glass windows, kitchen sideboards, old lighting fixtures all mixed into new housing stock in Maine.

So back to the big wide open expanse where your have the engineering trusses in place to be able to make it the focal point of your new Maine house.

Does all that glass, no cozy corners or hideaways make the new home in Maine less comfortable? Higher ceilings are a plus for anyone on the NBA but rob into living space. But if you the home builder only need a couple bedrooms and the family is raised and out of the nest, who cares right?

Old Maine Houses Had Butler Pantries, Sleeping Porches, Turrets And Fireplaces In Many Rooms. Lots Of Ginger Breading.

What if your home building couple is a second, third time or more around blended family?

His, hers, ours means gotta have room, living space to fit them all in. So a cape or colonial home with a basement to develop is often reflected when you study the house plans. As you unroll the blue print sketch and the schematic for all the major house systems.

Material costs go up and down and in my area of Maine, being right on the Canadian border, the lumber and other building items often purchased from across the US Canadian border. There are a lot of perks being a Maine border town with Canada.

Old housing in Maine often had hidden rear staircases and all the pantries, butler closets and servants corners were hidden from view or easy access.

All that space is up for grabs to repurpose and slim and trim. Today, redesign and serious reduction of the square footage to stretch the dollar in a time of heavy duty inflation, heating, financing costs means study lots of housing plans. Your home should be a place that fits your lifestyle and budget.

Bay Windows, Patterned Floors, Built In Cabinets, Dumb Waiters… Old Victorians Built, Filled In Differently.

Maine is a handful of cities and over 450 small communities.

Building big and gaudy to impress is not something that happens in rural Maine. Maybe along Ocean Ave or crawling along the rocking coast of Maine where out of state plates in the expensive zip codes happens. But not in sparse populated rural sections of Vacationland, where Maine Yankee frugality forces house building to be practical and functional.

Maine house building up on the upswing and off grid, no year round access is a positive to some.

The new Maine homes with expansive open decking right off living area for everyday use and easy outdoor access. Also seeing rustic cozy touches, lots of stones weaved into the landscaping to make the new construction Maine home reflect the spirit of the owner.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North ST Houlton ME 04730 USA

September 6, 2024
Buy Maine Land, Build Slowly

Buy Maine land, build very slowly.

Maine real estate property listing inventory continues to be in short supply. The tight housing market in Maine makes some think why not buy Maine land, build slowly? Many in the home buying audience consider why not buy land in Maine first? Then tackle the building a house one board at a time very carefully.

Home On The Range… Er I Mean In Maine? More Space, Lower Price, Less People!

This blog post is for folks sick, sore and tired waiting for the right new property housing to get listed.

Bare inventory homes for sale shelves mean consider buying Maine land. Challenged, frustrated Maine home buyers are slipping on the tool belt and strapping on the construction helmet. Not thinking McMansion but just a simple Maine house of their own to enjoy.

Here is an option for those with lots of patience that have a few building skills.

For folks sitting on the sidelines waiting around while the flow of Maine house listings to increase, building on Maine land is another route to consider some.

Maine’s rural nature and “money does not grow on trees” simple way of living causes a more robust skill set. Growing up, as a kid, you did help Dad shingle the garage roof, put on the new house addition.

Your Own House In Maine Built From Scratch. Could You, Would You Do It?

Your uncle is a plumber, a niece can get you a 20% percent family discount at the hardware store. Your lumber can come direct from your own woodlot milled at a local outlet.

Calling in favors from say your brother in law the electrician helps short circuit the high cost of building a house in Maine. Buying Maine land and then the one by one improvements takes delicate baby steps when talking finish work.

Buy Maine land.

BYOB, bring your own building. Start from scratch. Involve your family and friends who are willing to help. These “helpers” are like construction worker trainees learning from your project to down the road start their own. Join forces to “slow cook” and build a house.

A land property acreage listing in Maine with drilled well and septic system already in place is a four leaf clover.

It is a bonus when you don’t have to do the Earth work for a driveway and culvert. Or if the lawn is already established. Maine land where a mobile home was sold off or hauled away after a fire create these kind of listings.

Land in Maine to build your own house, here’s another option for home construction.

When a house was torn down and hauled away , this is another value added land listing to consider. But check to see what the well and septic system are. A dug well with low supply of water and a cesspool sewer or small metal tank is not designed for today’s household demands.

Why don’t more folks build a house rather than buy an existing Maine home?

Country Home, Your Outbuildings On The Maine Farmstead. Could You Build Your Own Slowly?

Expense, the size of a mortgage or difficulty getting a construction loan with tight deadlines. Just not knowing anyone to help with carpentry skills and not so handy themselves doing repairs.

The whatever you build might not be perfect but it it yours and paid for as you go. That lifestyle in Maine of building in a rural setting and living off the land as much as possible appeals to many today.

Maine Land, Lots Of Property Acreage To Build Your Own Home On In Maine!

Another incentive to buy Maine land and build slowly is stop bleeding rent.

When you have enough money to build a foundation to hunker down in until able to build up, you say good bye to a landlord. No more helping whoever you rent from send their kids to college or make the apartment house mortgage payments.

Getting a small mortgage to create the bare bones for living and being a cellar dweller for as long as it takes.

Lots of discipline needed but monthly what you would have shelled out for rent gets redirected into home improvements.

When you “slow cook” and build your own house on Maine land, there is no snap your fingers quick decision making done. Instead, you take lots of time to shop for materials and wait for a sale. More thought is put into what the end product will look like. There is no haste makes waste.

Not everyone builds a house because they can not find one that checks off all the boxes either.

Some just want to once in their life time to walk into a home that is totally them. Filled with what they liked in previous house features and none of what they did not enjoy.

Having Your own Maine House, Two Cats In The Yard. Priceless. (Now You Humming The Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young Song “Our House”?)

Have a couple who just bought Aroostook County land in the New Limerick , Maine.

His family has backhoes, dump trucks and other construction equipment. The long driveway is already in for free and not hired out for a fee. Where they will slowly build a country home has been cleared and stumps removed by themselves.

The hole for the house cellar will be done weekends and nights.

There is a little ledge but that they may hire out to be ripped. But any expenses is eagle eye balled and house building money is spent very frugally.

Getting estimates from bids for the lowest price for anything. It just makes you being your own general contractor thrifty.

Camp Or Cabin Starter House In Maine. Some Go This Route Before The Main House.

Buy Maine land, build slowly means having lots of patience and determination.

It pays off big time. Not everyone can do it due to family and wallet size or lack of savings constraints. But it is an option for some to buy land and build if an existing Maine home to consider is missing.

Once you get the building “buttoned up and weather tight” it is liking camping out in the Maine home.

Small Maine towns don’t have the restrictive codes and time deadlines to complete the projects. Contractors and tradesmen are looking for inside work in the winter months.

Getting the work done you don’t have the expertise to do means stretching your dollars. Hiring out as little as possible. Or waiting until the house building kitty grows enough to afford bring in the professionals.

Building a house in Maine means you make some sacrifices along the way and will have a table saw in your living room.

Construction projects happening around the house you build slowly on your Maine land. What to do first and back up projects in case the Maine weather throws you a curve. You juggle your real job that pays the bills. While moonlight on the house that reflects your needs, family size and personal desires.

The hardwood floors for the Maine house?

They come last because no one wants scratches from metal stage being pulled over to help joint compound the walls or ceilings. Four walls, a floor and a roof is the basic box you start out with and then slow but slow add to the finishing it off just so. Buying Maine land tips for the dream house in your head.

What To Consider, Buying Maine Land To Build Your Own House!

That big closet off the living room is a future bath that is all plumbed in but no fixtures brought in for the down the road intended purpose. The plumbing in your Maine house is back to back with the kitchen waterworks to save money. The cost building a house in Maine on your own land depends an awful lot on the home design. Considering a log home design? The exterior walls are complete and so are the inside ones.

But a true log house design means the insurance costs is going to tap your wallet or purse harder.

A fire means those spruce purloins overhead have to be totally replaced. Not just a section of the home is damaged to repair.

Dimensional lumber comes in only so many widths and lengths for your affordable house construction hammer and nails.

Not having to make unneeded cuts that waste time or being able to use the left over waste to cross bridge the floor or close in the insulated box sills. Plan your work or plan to fail. You gotta have a system is what my Dad caught be growing up on the Maine farmstead. A lot too this buy Maine land, building slowly.

I asked the couple who bought the Maine land in Aroostook County about a basement kitchen.

Reasons To Call Maine Your Home. Why To Consider Building A House in Maine! The Four Season Outdoor Recreation Surrounds You!

Instead of wasting money on cabinets, they will have a set tub to wash dishes, use a hot plate and microwave for cooking. Go outside to flip up the lid on the gas grill for the ‘what’s for dinner” routine.

They don’t want to spend money needlessly on a full blown kitchen. Both are on the same page for waiting until the first floor is framed in for the real deal and all the cupboards just the way they want. To install the permanent kitchen set up for once and done “upstairs” above the ground floor, not duplicate the effort in the cellar. That’s the house plan to economize.

Any small discomfort living in the basement only fuels and speeds up the process to keep the house building moving faster.

Tightening up the everyday spending to the maximum. Less eating out, keeping the car or truck and extra year because it is all paid for and not a financial drain that siphons from the house building effort.

Where You Build Your House Starts With The Where You End Up Constructing A Maine Home. Waterfront Has Shoreland Zoning To Protect The What’s Out Front.

Your lot , the Maine land spot makes a big difference on the house building construction costs too.

Drainage for water, is there ledge that messes up the daylight basement, is there a slope enough to have a daylight cellar?

You have a blank white parchment to paint a house on that does not exist yet. But it’s not something many of us do everyday so go slow, bone up on the knowledge that is all over the Internet. Talk to folks who bought Maine land, built. Ask them what they regret and the building points they are grateful for during the house building project. Mistakes are learning lessons to share and avoid.

Buy Maine land, build slowly.

Low cost Maine land is everywhere. The best perfect location to build on, there is the hard part in your Maine real estate search. On your wish list, where is view, waterfront, distance to the essentials? Does the house you plan to build match the lot and what’s the neighborhood like or is there anyone around you? Lots to consider going in, during and wrapping up the building a house on your own Maine land exercise.

Eating, breathing, sleeping the all consuming build a home mission that takes over their life.

But knowing the sacrifice is self-inflicted and so so worth it in the end to create a home sweet home. Taking your time, getting what you want and not living in someone else’s house plan? Could you do it, buy Maine land and build a house slowly? Here to help find you the perfect spot for your new Maine home!

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North ST Houlton Maine 04730 USA

January 13, 2024
History Of The Maine Home, What Was The Original Builder Thinking?

History of the Maine home, what was the original house builder thinking?

Maine has plenty of older housing stock. And along the way as a home owner sold and moved along, the new house buyer often adds his or her own “stamp” to the original floor plan. Colors change, landscaping updates happen or everything stays steady as she goes for the status quo. You would never know the house had changed hands or that there was a real estate sale that just happened.

Do you look into the history of why the original house in Maine on the empty lot turned out the way it did?

Homes, Houses Built In Maine. All Kinds, But Tend To Be On The Older Housing Stock Variety.

I think a lot about the real estate location and who built this Maine home whenever listing one to market online.

Was the house builder copying the layout from someone locally or from experience across the pond? Back before America became an independent small collection of states, a lot of what was built modeled after other country’s popular housing blueprints.

Does the house for sale in Maine fit in with the style, square footage style and auxiliary buildings placed up and down the street or road?

Little Features, Original Style And Flair. Maine Homes Not Cookie Cutter Simple Or Modern As A Rule.

And the design of the Maine home, was it simply from from whatever was popular at the time?

Was what is at the mailing address now what the place always looked like? Or was there a fire in the “L” on the back? What you see added touring it now, is it much different than the original structure wings? Maybe lightning hit the farm barn. Or new too much moisture wet hay stored. Then heated up and caused the blaze that took out a few of the Maine house farmstead buildings. Wild fire may have caused the house design changes through the years.

The 40′, 60, 100′ foot or more center stone of the Maine farm barn is the most precious in the collection. And the hardest to build or get insured. With rural farm property, the emphasis was on the barn, machine shed, storage houses that made your money. The houses were labeled “New England” and call it good. Plain Jane, no fireplaces, no ornate woodwork. You and the rest of the family did not entertain. Were out working the pasture farm fields with crops and critters. Or out in one of the buildings working on machinery or watering, graining the horses, cows and other livestock.

Questions come to mind touring a new property listing in Maine putting the hen scratching details on the clipboard initial tour.

Classic, Attractive, Not So Common Housing Styles. We’re Talking Maine Yesteryear Homes Aren’t We?

Does the house in Maine fit the spot on the lot or could have the site selection been better?

Where it was built on the landscape? Does it fit comfy and well spaced or stand out like a sore throbbing thumb? Maybe the spot had much or not much thought applied. To answer the quandry of where to build and how to make it all blend in with the least amount of visual static or eye sore. Possibly, the extra lot next door was purchased long after the house in Maine was built. There was a house where this house should have been built already hogging space to next door.

So the why didn’t they move it over and place the footprint of the old house in Maine back off more from the street?

Ah, because they did not own that land then. Or streets were not so busy or so wide so that kinda of future consideration did not cross the original builder or house owner’s mind. And what is here now and how much it still mirrors the original house design? Lack of funds or just don’t care about “this old house” like the original owner or builder does impact what we list and sell today in Maine.

Something Modern, Glass, Open Living Concept For A Vacation Home In Maine. Short Stint Stays, Maybe To Rent Out On AirBnB For Profit When Not Used.

With waterfront properties in Maine, there are lots of constraints to fit in and company with shore land zoning regulations.

No one wants to knowingly hurt the Maine lake, pond, stream, river or oceanfront out front. But erosion from too many trees removed combined with a steep incline to water’s edge to improve the view hurts the natural resource. Dirt dumped into a Maine lake by racing water carrying everything into the waterfront delicate wildlife and fish home.Very bad for the Maine environment.

Vacation McMansions and development like big paved parking lots, crew cutting all hilly landscaped hurts the original setting and soil stability.

Bigger, kinda gaudy house designs too may have built along the coastline of Southern Maine if an hour or less from the border are popular and trendy for the time.

But the rest of Maine does not rock and roll that way the further up into Vacationland you point the car or SUV or bike. Or wrapped around the way the builders put them together decades or centuries ago?

Stock plan or developer’s unique model in Maine using an architect, you just don’t see 300 lot subdivisions in a row like “Knot’s Landing”.

Even the brick work is ornate in small Maine town market squares. Made to last and usually to replace the wooden structures. The ones lost in a fire where someone kicked over a lantern in a horse stable out back behind the mercantile outlet.

Small Town Houlton Maine, Walk To Everything Easy! Everyone Waves And Is Neighborly Friendly.

So Victorian Queene Anne in town castle home, cute cape wearing natural graying cedar shingles.

A farmstead home with wrap around open or glassed porch to slurp hot coffee on as the sun rises. Or something colder, bitter like lemons as it sets in the west. Lake shore cottages can be pretty swanky but still dubbed “the camp” for vacation trips uptah Maine. Or often the house is a building or two repurposed. Hauled in on a trailer truck flatbed or pull to the lot by a team of horses or a Maine farm tractor. Or it is a church made into a home or event center to rent out for parties, weddings, graduations or family reunions.

Where I live in Aroostook County Maine, many barrack buildings from Camp Houlton, a German prisoner of war compound out at the airbase became a place to own not rent during peacetime.

Churches that became a home for more than folks working once a week on the condition of their souls. The old Grange Hall that needed a new purpose has been the “home” we listed and sold. Like this one in Weston, Maine in the East Grand Lake region below.

Grand Center Staircase Houses In Small Town Maine. Low Cost, Well Preserved, Loaded With Fine Details.

Renovating older houses in Maine.

Converting buildings to houses that had another purpose when they were first built. Slow cooked, do as much as you can yourself to save on the 2/3rd labor bill for whoever is hired to swing the hammer, run the saw across the boards. Building new houses that have the flair and features of yesteryear tied and tested classic designs and lines.

Grange Hall In Maine Repurposed Into A Home. This One In Weston ME Near East Grand Lake Four Season Vacation Fun.

Colonial, Federal, Green Revival, Mansard, New England, Cape or hip roof style homes in Maine.

It’s fun to list and market them all. Maine is not just the average 5-3-1 basic ranch style show box 24’x40′ starter home getting built and peddled.

Log homes, cottage simple homesteads where the Maine land is the star. Not the sticks and bricks.

Heck a yurt, a sod roof house built into the side hill or a geodesic dome “hippy house” It’s all good in Maine, the way life should be. Less building codes, no HOA’s and common sense still works here in the Pine Tree state. What would you build for a Maine home? Do you consider what the original builder on the house lot and had in mind that you feel obligated to preserve and maintain?

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North ST Houlton ME 04730 USA

June 2, 2023
High Home Heating Oil Costs, How’s Your Maine House Insulation?

High home heating oil costs, how’s your Maine house insulation?

Everything Goes White When Winter Weather Arrives In Maine. Heating Your Maine House, Being Prepared Is Key To Enjoying, Not Dreading Winter.

In Maine, heating with wood is not a new fad.

Maine is 91% wooded land, covered with mixed and softwood trees of all species. If burning wood to heat your Maine home is nothing new, the high price of oil gallon packs less of a sting. You hear lament from those who don’t have a wood or pellet stove about how expensive heating their Maine home is going to be this winter. Time to think about insulating more. To spend less on Maine home heating energy costs.

Many of Maine houses were built when oil heating prices per gallon were in the teens, the homes very large to fit in all the family members. Heating with wood is nothing new to most local Maine house owners.

Heating Your Maine Home With Wood. Saving On Energy Bills Putting Another Log On The House Heater Stove Fire.

Less money spent on something else the plan to shoulder the weight of extra expense heating the Maine house.

Assume the position and open up the wallet wide. To pay for the higher heating oil from the beep beep beep backing up tank truck with the long hose and screw on nozzle. Most Mainer home owners don’t take the price hike of heating oil laying down. They go into battle stations to do something about lowering the house energy heating costs on Maine homes.

But if you are elderly, not so spry hefting a 16 inch or whatever size piece of hardwood to feed the Maine house heater stove.

Those are the really vulnerable Mainers on a small fixed income where there is no slack to tighten up the finances.

Folks who want to continue to age in place in their own home sweet home. But worry about how the heck are they going to heat the Maine house this winter? With the extra burden of high heating oil per gallon costs to tackle?

This blog post is about making your Maine house easier to heat and the added benefit, to coo the home.

Bigger, Older The Maine House, The Harder To Heat The Home. Maine, Affordable Housing But It Is On The Larger, Yesteryear Vintage That Can Suck Up Energy.

Insulating the older Maine housing stock and ways to economically stretch hard earned dollars. To cut back on heating oil consumption with some effort in beefing up the Maine house insulation.

Oh great, another blog post on insulating your house in Maine.

I heard the groans and loud audible whispers. Haven’t we got a slew of those that come up in a Google search already? I think more push to better insulate our older Maine housing stock and ways to underwrite it for the home owner is critical. Rather than just roll over and just complain, paying the long dollar for heating oil. Let’s get into insulation battle mode to attack the aging housing stock in the big, drafty existing small Maine town communities.

It’s supposed to be 83 degrees today on a July Maine summer day. But in the back of my mind I have been worried about what needs to be done now.

To prepare for Maine winter and knowing more insulation also makes the Maine house easier to cool. Not just tied to heating at whatever adjust house thermostat setting.

The Solitude, Peaceful Feeling Of The Maine Woods In Winter. Just Because It’s Winter, We Don’t Hibernate, Are Outside Every Day Of The Year To Enjoy Vacationland.

Mainers get up early, open all the house windows to capture the cooler temperatures.

Then shut the blinds, close all the doors, darken the place up to enjoy the cooler temperatures as a Maine summer day as the sun rises heating up the outside of Vacationland. A smaller one room air conditioner is installed. Maybe the Maine home owner is lucky enough to have a heat pump to cool a portion of their place. We don’t try to heat or cool the entire Maine home. Just the living absolute necessary portions then closing off the rest no one is using.

Hot or cold temperatures wherever your home in Maine is located and how to cope best with them.

It is way way easier to maintain a comfortable Maine home’s inside temperature if there is less living area to worry about and adequate insulation is in place. How much insulation is up in the Maine home attic, the cap over the ceilings over your head and under the roof?

Maybe some shade trees could help shield the home in the summer months and are needed. Insulation, be warm, save money.. that’s what Efficiency Maine is all over to reduce your energy costs.

Smaller Maine Town Living, More Outdoors Happens. Heating The Home Usually Involves Fire Wood If Oil Energy Prices Hike Higher.

When was the home in Maine insulated last and with what material?

Usually, the not knowing is because it’s hard telling accessing your attic area under the eaves. Many times where the square scuttle hole is to get into an attic is missing. Not easy to find or not out in the hall obvious. Maybe it’s stuck in one of the bedroom closets filled to the brim with clothes, boxes, luggage.

No hatch after looking everywhere? Make one, then let’s get a ladder. Open up that hatch on the Maine home. To see what’s in the attic for insulation. Now that you have access to the attic, what should the insulation R-value be? The pull down stairway attic entrance are quick and easy to access the attic. But when they are not being used during the winter months, they better be thoroughly sealed off to avoid lots of precious heat loss.

Treasure In The Woods Getting Your Firewood To Heat Your Home! Old Cars Past Their Prime. Hanging Around For Hunters, Hikers, Land Brokers.

And just as important, to avoid expensive warm house air hitting the cold roof line and forming condensation, the ice hanging off the Maine house eaves.

Ventilation is a twin sister to insulation issues and just as important as you button up the Maine house from the outside weather elements. Staying warm over a long Maine winter, the state got 25 million energy saving weatherization dollars last November to help fight the cold.

What Maine weatherization programs are out there to help elderly, anyone low income to improve their home’s insulation?

Making a Maine apartment the tenant has to heat is just as important to be proactive in reducing heating oil, electricity, gas, etc consumption. When Mainers are under stress, they don’t sit on their hands and feel helpless. Lowering the cost of heating the Maine single family or multi unit rental apartment house, where you work, a school, hospital, any building is priority one.

What other areas to improve for your Maine home or apartment building insulation?

Getting Around In Maine, Lots Of Options In Vacationland. Fire Wood One Option For Winter Heating Maine Houses.

Basement walls insulated four feet down, with the Maine house box sills filled too will help some of the heat loss.

Storm doors, a campaign to update not just the windows but the cavity around them all help make the Maine home more efficient to heat and cool too. More tips on insulating Maine houses to not over spend trying to heat them.

Statewide in Maine, I think more effort to tackle the insulation values in all the state’s housing just makes perfect sense.

Spending a little money to save a lot of it is common sense. Plus it makes Maine jobs. Someone has to feed the insulation hopper out in the yard with bags of cellulose as the guy or gal on the other end of the hose carefully fills the attic cap. Or taps the drilled holes in the side of the Maine home that need some insulation love filling the wall cavities.

The Wedding Cake House In Kennebunk Maine, One Of The Most Photographed Homes. Costs A Pretty Penny To Heat.

Here is another important link to visit to get help with insulating your Maine home.

Also places to check out for energy credits, deals on buying the insulation product you need as we wage war on the high cost of heating / cooling Maine houses.

How are you doing making your Maine house more energy efficient to beat the heat costs, to enjoy warm winters and cooler summers?

Share the ways you are shaving the energy costs so everyone can stop shivering and warm up to pro-active measures to insulate the Maine housing stock. Like a Maine farmer always thinking a season or two ahead, Maine home owners do the same thing. Even with 80 plus degree summer temperatures, you see Maine home owners with woodchuck like high piles of woods behind their houses.

Next Year’s Wood Pile In Tree Live Form. Ready To Knit On, To Slowly Cut And Split Into Just The Right Stove Lengths. Mainers Stay A Season Ahead With Their Wood Stash.

Cords of cut, stacked, seasoning wood for the next heating season is just boy scout readiness and making the most of any situation coming up the pike. Kinda partial to Jotul wood heater stoves. What’s your favorite brand? Thanks for sticking around to the end of this blog post on Maine heating, insulating your house.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North ST Houlton ME 04730 USA

July 23, 2022
Maine Home Insulation | Warmer Winters Cooler Summers

Maine home insulation, making warmer winters, cooler summers happen.

More comfort at your home in Maine wherever you hang your hat starts with planning. No matter what the cost of energy to heat or cool your Maine home. No one likes to waste hard earned dollars.

Planning For The Next Maine Winter Heating Season Early On. Energy Weatherization Tightening Up The Maine Home.

But true Mainers watching the gas pump and heating oil prices hike higher don’t panic.

Live a few years in rural Maine and what to do to make the most of things is not so hard. Living in Maine makes you way way more resourceful, independent, creativel.

Less emotion and more plan of action is how Mainers maneuver harsh weather, spells of poor heath or during economic setbacks.

The towns in Maine are smaller and tighter and work together to conquer problems. Accepting the mantra “if it is to be, it is up to me”. Taking charge for the plan of attack on whatever the issue living in Maine as a full time native.

So Maine home insulation.

How to tackle the living space you call home. To make sure cracks and crevices are well sealed. Tight is right. Making sure that Maine home attic areas are super insulated and well ventilated.

Big homes in Maine, those are the biggest energy hogs to ride herd on all year long.

Large families, growing up on farms and working the mills, out in the back forty woodlot in Maine meant bigger housing needed. Large families of yesteryear number ten and more were common in Maine. More than the now standard 1.6 children per family in the USA. Maine has a lot of larger, grand older housing stock to insulated and heat as efficiently as possible. No one has money to burn in small town rural Maine.

The Bigger The Maine Home, The Greater The Cost Heating / Cooling It!

Chances are this is not your first blog post in the search for insulation tips to save hard earned dollars used to purchase energy.

Energy conservation is best approached from lots of angles. First, how big a place do you need now? Your real estate housing needs changes as families arrive and eventually leave the nest. Or housing multi generations under one roof to be the most economically efficient. The trend to share the roof line is a healthy one on many levels.

Those grandchildren benefit from gram and gramps helping instill values and developing the right Maine attitude for success in life.

Heat Loss, Making A Maine Home Easier To Cool. How Tight Is Your Maine Home? Thermal Imaging To Know Where To Tighten Up Your Home In Maine.

The kids enrich the the older generation’s quality of life too. And Mom and Dad sure could use the helping hand and back up support when their parents live local or share the same mailbox address.

Insulation tip number one is share space rather than lots of room but only a few people wasting it.

How much space do you really need and what are the reasons to use more than you need?

Saving Money Heating, Cooling Your Maine Home. Upgrading Heating Systems, Lighting, The Way You Heat Your Water.

In rural Maine, the desire to make others envious observing how much space your McMansion takes up is gone.

Practical, frugal, form follows function rules the day. Not trying to be snarky or put on airs to impress anyone.

Insulation tip number two is reduce what you use as family size shrinks.

Consider adding an efficiency apartment to Air BnB or rent out someone all alone. The income from the extended stay renter say that works as a traveler at the local health care facility can enrich your life and the tenant’s too!

Maine, The Way Life Should Be! Welcome To Vacationland! Common Sense Still Used In Our Daily Life. Not Outdated.

Close off what you don’t use. Less square footage means an easier time keeping it warm or cool depending on the month showing on the kitchen calendar.

Sometimes selling the big ark and downsizing to something one floor and smaller just makes sense.

Trading places with someone in the accumulation phase and raising or blending families who has out grown their current 2 bedroom ranch style home.

Insulation tip number three involves a physical inspection of your current Maine home.

Before throwing lots of money into the latest trending energy saving devices, examine the Maine house or apartment for tightness.

Loose as a goose with gaps air can come and go as it pleases is going to waste lots of energy dollars.

What’s capping your attic space, how efficient your windows and doors are, what heat loss happens in your basement area?

What is in the walls for insulation and before you add exterior vinyl siding, consider some outside foam board insulation.

Making heating and cooling your home a game, a sport, rising to the challenge.

Lots of rebates for energy savings if you look online or at the local Maine hardware and building store. Here’s is the Efficiency Maine home insulation website short cut link.

Planning, Thinking About Maine Winter Heater Happens Year Round. Staying A Couple Seasons Ahead How We Mainers Roll.

What you purchase for water heaters, home appliances, lighting fixtures and the how to warm and cool your living space has many facets.

Here are at home cost incentive options to save money at your residence. Saving money on your energy costs is not just limited to your Maine home either. Work, schools, health care facilities.. what gets chewed up on the commercial and institutional side of energy costs matters just as much. More on that work side of energy efficiency and incentive rebates options.

Growing up, each late fall the Maine farm house was banked with fir bows and sheathing.

Enjoy The Season You Are In, Preparing For The Next One Approaching. Winter Always In The Mental Planning Stages.

The trip to get fresh bows from the farm’s wooded sections was a ritual.

One practiced right along with having a year ahead supply of cut, stacked, seasoned fire wood. Wood to heat your home as a renewable resource was everywhere and tightening up the old farmstead was not as critical. Not like now where heating oil is precious and comes at a high cost.

In those early years, the state highway department crews put up snow fences along the major roadway arteries. To control drifting snow and save money spend winging back the new storm flakes to keep traffic moving efficiently.

All Four Seasons, Most Mainers Are “Outdoors” Year Round! Enjoying Space In Maine But Dressed Accordingly Prepared For Whatever the Weather Cast Delivers.

We dressed differently than some today too when winter weather was happening around us growing up in small town rural Maine.

Waiting for the school bus at the end of the farm house driveway, you had the winter coat zipped up tightly. The one bought with your own money picking potatoes with all your family and friends out in the farm field. Mittens, hat, stockings and scarf knit by mom or gram and maybe a long underwear layer. Prepared, comfortable, braced to weather any storm in life. Not shivering and feeling helpless wearing a short sleeve shirt, no hat, no gloves or coat.

Not trucked by your parents door to door and hanging inside 97% of the time year round.

No, no. Just one trip on the big yellow number 13 bus at 7:15 each morning with delivery home at 3:30 in the afternoon. Just in time for farm chores and some time before supper to play outside with family and friends.

Fireplace In Maine, Looking To Warm Your Bones With A Wood Fire?

When there is less money to manage, better use of the funds happens. Here’s more Maine energy saving blog posts to glean.

Creative, practical, everything designed for survival of your family and Maine community.

That’s the same approach used to how best to manage high energy costs. Most Maine homes have a variety of heat sources so the ability to “play” the energy market happens. Not being pushed into a corner with no options is not how hardworking Mainer’s run their lives. Staying a step ahead and expecting setbacks, preparing for them before they happen.

Dozing Off In The Maine Lakeside Hammock. It’s A Good Feeling Knowing You Have Next Year’s Firewood All In Place.

What are you doing to step up the game heating or cooling your Maine home?

Driving, Living, Deal With Winter And Snow. Everyone Living Full Time In Maine Stays Prepared For The Winter, The Heating Season.

Heat pump hanging off the side of your house or ceiling fans being installed to move the air up or down depending on the season? Any cutting edge energy saving building tips to share for new construction? Or old tried and tested methods to squeeze the maximum BTU value out of your hard earned energy dollars?

Do you heat your Maine home with cords of wood or pallet bags of pellets?

Considering buying an electric car or a moped or peddle bike? Do you ride share to your Maine job? Or telecommute to work remotely in Maine? Winter in Maine is always in the corner of your eye or back of your mind.

Now is the time to tackle the Maine home to make sure the energy dollars are not going up the chimney.

Making a game of how to heat your place best and to be the most comfortable. For peace of mind and comfort wherever your live, work or play in Maine.

Working hard to up on the latest insulation, weatherization Keeping the winter cold, Jack Frost from your door because your Maine home insulation is to snuff. All the latest weatherization energy saving rebates have been explored and tapped.

I’m Maine REALTOR Andrew Mooers, ME Broker

207.532.6573 | info@mooersrealty.com |

MOOERS REALTY 69 North ST Houlton ME 04730 USA

June 6, 2022