In honor of Vermont Homesharing Week, HomeShare Vermont will be hosting two open houses. Drop by the HomeShare Vermont satellite office at 149 State St. in Montpelier (June 7, 11-1 pm) or our main office at 412 Farrell St., Suite 300 in South Burlington (June 9, 4-6 pm) and meet our staff and volunteers while enjoying snacks and refreshments. Learn more about our homesharing services and see why we’ve been successfully making homeshare matches for 40 years during a short informational session. This event is free and open to the public, so feel free to bring a friend or two!

Montpelier open house: Tuesday, June 7 at 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.
So. Burlington open house: Thursday, June 9 at 4 to 6 p.m.

An Evening of Storytelling celebrating HomeShare’s 40th Anniversary
at the Double E Performance Center in Essex
Thursday, April 14, 2022 7-9PM

Storytellers: Moth award winning storytellers, Sue Schmidt and Kevin Gallagher, and other auditioned storytellers are back this year to share with us true tales that will entertain and inspire. You will also hear stories from our very own homeshare participants!

Music: Live musical interludes will be performed by The Brevity Thing – Dave Ball (guitar, harp), Jom Hammack (mandolin), Steve Goldman (upright bass), and Sue Schmidt (drums).

Tickets: $40 each Attend in person or view virtually online. Watch show online here.

The Details: Doors open at 6:00 pm, goodies & cash bar available, program starts at 7:00 pm, proof of vaccination & masks required.

Home & Away Raffle (sold out)

Win a $500 gift certificate to Gardener’s Supply or a 2-night stay for up to 4 people in a cottage on Lake Champlain’s Missisquoi Bay, located in Swanton, VT. Relax and decompress, watch the beautiful sunset, enjoy swimming, kayaking, or fishing the best bass and northern pike territory on the Lake. Located 1 hour from Burlington or Montreal, immediately adjacent to great hiking in the Missisquoi Wildlife Refuge. ($800 value) 

Winners will be drawn in advance of the event. You do not have to attend the event to win.

We want to extend our deepest gratitude to everyone who helped make this event possible, including Sue Schmidt, Kevin Gallagher, The Brevity Thing, our homesharers, Media Factory, Double E Performance Center, the Fun-raising Committee, and the sponsors below.

Seven Days helped get our 40th year off on the right foot! Check out the article about HomeShare Vermont in the NEST issue of the latest edition of Seven Days on newsstands from Jan. 19-25. Even our office dog, Moose, makes an appearance. Thanks to Jeri and Dan, and Theresa and Amy for being willing to share their homeshare match stories.

You can read all about our successes and bright points of the past year in our Annual Report. Plus, we have two new HomeShare match stories for you to enjoy!

Stories from the Heart

Our Rescheduled (from 2020), Reformatted (online, but still live)
Pandemic Edition of an Evening of Storytelling
Wednesday, April 14, 2021 at 7-8 p.m. Eastern Time (watch recording online)
“A Shot in the Arm!”

Storytellers: We are so lucky to have Moth award winning storytellers, Sue Schmidt and Kevin Gallagher, back this year to share with us true tales that will entertain and inspire. You will also hear stories from our very own homesharers!

Music: Live musical interludes will be performed by The Brevity Thing – Dave Ball (guitar, harp), Jom Hammack (mandolin), Steve Goldman (upright bass)

Cost: Free!

Watch online

Due to the continuing concerns surrounding COVID-19, our offices are currently open but we will best be able to serve you if you called ahead to schedule an appointment. We are currently accepting and processing new applications, conducting background and reference checks, and interviewing new applicants by phone or video. We’re also back to making new homesharing matches safely and thoughtfully. Please feel free to call our office at 802-863-5625 if you have any questions.

Are you looking for the latest guidance on how you could build an Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU) in your backyard or an internal conversion within your home? 

Join AARP Vermont & HomeShare Vermont for a free informational webinar on March 25, 2021 from 12-1PM. This webinar will cover the benefits and of ADUs, architectural design ideas, the latest zoning regulations, and the steps required to get an ADU permitted and built in Burlington. We will focus on answering practical questions from homeowners on the permitting and designs requirements to building an ADU in your backyard. Register here.

Accessory Dwelling Units (ADU) are small houses or apartments that exist on the same property lot as a single-family residence — this traditional home type is re-emerging as an affordable and flexible housing option that meets the needs of older adults and young families alike.

Some Benefits of Accessory Dwelling Units:

• ADUs can enable homeowners to provide needed housing for their parents, adult children, grandchildren or other loved ones.

• An ADU can provide older adults a way to downsize on their own property while a tenant or family member resides in the larger house.

Speakers:

• Kelly Stoddard Poor, AARP
• Kirby Dunn, HomeShare VT
• Missa Aloisi, Hinge Architecture
• Staff of Burlington Planning & Zoning

We are writing to you, a supporter of HomeShare Vermont, with exciting news! HomeShare Vermont will be expanding our service area to cover three additional counties in Vermont starting November 1. 

For over a decade, homesharing services have been provided to Vermonters by two small and independent non-profit organizations: Home Share Now (covering Washington, Lamoille and Orange counties) and HomeShare Vermont (covering Chittenden, Addison, Grand Isle and Franklin counties). Each organization has had its own board, staff, office and systems.

Over the past few months, discussions have taken place between the two organizations to determine how best to efficiently and cost effectively provide strong, sustainable homesharing services to Vermonters. To achieve these goals, our organizations made the decision to have homesharing services provided by one organization.

This decision will provide more streamlined and efficient homesharing service delivery. By combining efforts, we will have one website, annual report, audit, outreach plan, etc. By centralizing the administration, we can put more resources directly into client services.

Effective November 1, 2019 HomeShare Vermont will provide homesharing services to all seven counties listed above. A satellite HomeShare Vermont office will open in Montpelier at 149 State Street. To assure continuity of services, Aaron Guman, currently a staff member of Home Share Now, will be hired by HomeShare Vermont and will continue to serve homesharing participants in the central Vermont region.   

This is an exciting, but sizable, undertaking for us. Thank you for your support over the years and we hope you will continue to support our efforts to bring homesharing to more Vermonters. Please feel free to give us a call if you have any questions or concerns.

Regards,

Kirby Dunn

Margaret Cicchetti

Dear Friends,

We hosted a workshop at the Heineberg Community Center in Burlington on accessory dwelling units (ADUs). Since then we have had a small working group that has been meeting to develop a plan of action to help Burlington residents create more ADUs based on the program in the City of Brattleboro. 

A number of things are in the works. The City has completed a report on ADUs In Burlington, examining the current rules in the City and best practices around the country. As a result, the City Council and the Planning Commission will be reviewing ordinance changes to hopefully make it easier to build an ADU while reducing potential impacts. The Burlington Housing Summit in June 2019 included a discussion on ADUs to determine the timeline and scope of these changes. If you are interested in ADUs this would be a great place to let the City know so that it will get prioritized in their workplans. If you support ADUs as a way to help make ends meet, age in place or provide a home for family members, please let your city Councilors know!

HomeShare Vermont has also received a very small grant from the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board (VHCB) to provide outreach, public education and some technical assistance to help homeowners create ADUs as either a homesharing arrangement or an affordable rental.

The technical assistance could be:

• to help look at your home and decide the most feasible way to add an ADU;
• to get some professional design assistance and/or
• to help you navigate the permitting process. 

In conjunction with this technical assistance, the City of Burlington will be putting some CDBG funding aside to provide small grants or loans to help people create ADUs.

Similarly, HomeShare Vermont can help you find a tenant using their comprehensive screening and matching process if you decide you want to rent out your ADU.

We want to see many more ADUs get built in Burlington. Please let us know if you are planning to create an ADU in the next twelve months by completing this form and getting it back to us. This form doesn’t commit you to anything. It is just a way for us to get started and prioritize our work. We want to hear from you about what you might need to do a project. If you are not interested in adding an ADU to your home, please let us know that as well so we won’t continue to contact you. 

Please feel free to call me if you have any questions at 863-5625. We look forward to keeping in touch and working with you if you decide to go forward.

Regards,
Kirby

*To view our other resources regarding ADUs, click here.

Training for New and Emerging Homesharing Programs

Co-sponsored by NSHRC and HomeShare Vermont

Thursday and Friday, June 13-14, 2019 – Burlington, VT

This training is to help establish or fortify a new homesharing program based on the non-profit, comprehensive model that HomeShare Vermont has developed. The training is appropriate if you have a new program (3 years or less) or simply working towards establishing a new program.

To learn more about the training click here to read our full announcement.

If interested in attending, you can print off a registration form here.