VHFA will soon undertake a new initiative to acquire and restore foreclosed homes, before selling them to income-eligible Vermonters.

The Homeownership Acquisition and Rehabilitation Program (HARP), funded with at least $7 million from the Vermont Neighborhood Stabilization Program (VNSP), will increase Vermont's stock of desperately needed affordable housing, at the same time making responsible use of existing resources.

Properties that might be considered for the program are family homes that have been acquired by lending institutions and municipalities.

Truth be known, VHFA's stationery has been green for as long as just about anyone can remember. But soon it'll be "green," as in "environmentally-friendly."

Starting with our next print run, VHFA letterhead, envelopes and business cards will be printed using vegetable-based inks on paper stock composed of 100% post-consumer waste (PCW).

We use vegetable-based inks on nearly everything we print at the Agency — and our existing letterhead is no exception. Vegetable-based inks are more earth-friendly than their petroleum-based counterparts.

Yesterday we updated lender rankings on our Web site.

VHFA loans are originated through more than 30 participating lender across the state.  We display those lenders on the VHFA Web site — sorted by "production," or volume of VHFA loans they make.

Our top 10 lenders are now:

Uncertainty is a consistent theme among economists these days, with each round of projections for Vermont's plight worse than the last.

Columnist Robert Samuelson explained to the audience at a Vermont economy conference in early January the only other national economic experience like this was the spiraling inflation of the 1970s because, like now, people could not see where it would end.