At $585,000, the median sale price of single-family homes in Franklin, Massachusetts currently stands 19% above its prior all-time high of $489,900, set back in 2018.

It was a similar story for the overall real estate in Massachusetts: the median home sale price in the Bay State jumped 21% in the first half of the year.

Strong market for Franklin homes in 2021

As shown in the graphic above, the demand for homes in Franklin has been exceedingly strong in 2021. In addition to the 27% jump in median price, closed home sales and pending transactions rose in the first half of the year, while the average days on market fell to only fourteen days. Most tellingly, there currently is only just over a half-month of home inventory in Franklin – amazing!

Low housing inventories across Massachusetts

Scant housing inventory has become the norm throughout Massachusetts. Currently, there is only just over one month of housing inventory for sale in Massachusetts. Back when the market was weak in 2012, there were eighteen months of housing supply in the Commonwealth!

Such a strong housing market is not something that happens very often. You’d have to go back to the mid-1980s to find similar overwhelming demand for homes and such sharply rising home values, both in Franklin and across Massachusetts.

Video on your best strategies to succeed in 2021 real estate market in Massachusetts

The above video details the numbers that explain what is going on in MA real estate in 2021. It suggests strategies for both home buyers and home sellers that will empower you to navigate this active market and achieve success.

What the current market means for home buyers

Buyers have gotten used to long lines at open houses at listings that are new to the market. New listings draw lots of buyers.  If you put an offer in on a brand new listing that had a crush of buyers at the open house, you’ll likely be only one of many offers. Hot new listings routinely get ten, twenty or even thirty offers . . . in extreme cases , even more.  That’s a recipe for many frustrated home buyers!

Unless you are financially strong and can make an all-cash offer, or can pay at least 20% cash at closing, with hot new listings the odds are stacked against you. With so many competing offers to consider, sellers have to differentiate between all the offers in some way. The offers with less than 20% cash at closing likely won’t make even the initial cut.

Why get dismissed out of hand? You can increase your chances of getting your offer accepted by changing your strategy: don’t chase the hot new listings! Focus instead on longer days-on-market (DOM) homes. Homes with longer DOMs (10 to 14+ days on market) have failed to sell immediately. There will be less competition for those listings. These home sellers need you, and will view you as important. You’ll have a far better chance to get your offer considered and negotiate a sale. 

Many of the homes that do not sell immediately will have problems or objections.  If you can solve the problem or can live with the objectionable feature, you will be the “right buyer” for that listing.  Often it’s the “right buyers” who are the ones who get their offers accepted

What the current market means for home sellers

The amazing jump in home prices in 2021 will have a huge impact on your finances and your lifestyle options moving forward. If you’ve owned a home in Massachusetts for more than just a few years, you’re likely sitting on significant home equity.  You may now be in a position to use that equity to move to a better home that is more suitable for your current (and future) needs

If you’re in your 50s or 60s and have been living in your current home for many years, you may be able now to move to a new home to improve your financial health and advance the quality of your life.  (For example, you may decide to move to lower-cost housing or find a residence that is less burdensome to maintain.  Alternatively, many older homeowners seek to relocate to another area of the country to pursue new interests or to follow the kids as their adult lives unfold.) 

Determining your best next home

The hotlink at right and in the image above leads to a review of the housing choices and options people typically face as they advance through life.  The article covers the varying housing needs of people in each stage of life from early adulthood to retirement.

Finding your next home

Today’s fast-paced real estate market means you would be very wise to know where you are going to move to before you put your present home on the market.

If you don’t already own a second home, or are in the process of securing your next home,  how do you determine what to buy and where to live?

There is a very helpful planning tool that will guide you towards what features – and locations – you should prioritize in your next home. Created by Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices, the Real Estate and Lifestyle Planning Guide will help ensure that your next home matches your lifestyle and housing needs for years to come. You can download the first section of the Guide here, or by following the hotlink in the image above.

Use the form at the bottom of this post to request the complete Real Estate and Lifestyle Planning Guide. It will be instrumental in helping you secure the right “next home” for you. There is no cost, no obligation. Ask for your copy of the Guide today, by using the form below.

Getting your current home ready for market

The above image is from a home currently for sale on the MLS. Yes, someone allowed their home to be marketed with torn and half-removed wallpaper in the dining room – wow!. Just think of the unintended messages about the home (as well as the homeowner and the listing agent) this photo is sending to prospective buyers!

While there’s no need in today’s active real estate market to do a compete makeover of your home in order to sell it, you do have an opportunity to sell for a lot more money with some sensible, cost-effective pre-sale preparation.

What projects are sensible and which ones can you skip?

Follow the hotlink in the image above or at right to see how you can get your home in shape for marketing without spending a lot of time and money.

What your own home needs

If you’ve lived in your home for many years, it may very well have dated décor and tired fixtures in the kitchen and baths. (No buyer wants to move into a home that is still in the 1990s.)

And if you are like most people, you’ve collected lots of “stuff” over time.  So your home also could likely benefit from some serious decluttering.

See examples of how we have helped home sellers do strategic repairs and undertake the decluttering needed to get their properties in proper selling-shape. We can help you, too!

Use the form below to request a personalized analysis of how best to “showcase” your home for market. There’s no charge or obligation for this free consultation. (You can also use this form to ask for a copy of the Real Estate and Lifestyle Planning Guide discussed earlier in this post.)

Put yourself in position to take advantage of the historic run-up in home values. Contact us for a copy of the Guide and a free consultation today!

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Franklin’s median sale price is now $147,500 above where it stood back in the first quarter of 2015.  That’s a 39 percent jump. For homeowners in Franklin, it’s a wonderful time to sell . . . if you have somewhere to go! (See end of post for more on this.)

Video detailing real estate market in Franklin during 1^st quarter

Watch the above video to get a “what’s in it for me” depiction of the red hot housing market conditions in Franklin, Massachusetts during the initial three months of 2021.

Offers above asking price now the norm

Mirroring fevered market conditions throughout the I-495 region and across much of Massachusetts, bidding wars and over-asking price offers became the expected routine for homes listed in the first quarter of 2021.

In a compelling sign of rising home prices, the percentage of home selling price to original list price exceeded 100% in Franklin for the first time since Franklin sales data started being maintained by MLS-PIN back in the late 1990s.

Very few homes available

Home buyers in Franklin, as in most other communities in Massachusetts, faced appallingly low supplies of homes for sale in the first quarter of 2021. As of April 1, there were only six single-family homes for sale in Franklin, MA.

That’s an absurdly low number of homes for sale in a community of over 34,000 residents with a housing stock of 7,744 single-family homes, according to the town’s assessor records.

That compares to seventeen homes for sale the previous April 1^st and, more tellingly, thirty-one homes available on April 1 in 2018 and fifty-one single-family homes for sale in Franklin at the start of April in 2016.

Fractional months of supply

Expressed as months of supply, the picture for beleaguered home buyers in 2021 looks even bleaker.

From nearly nine months of supply in March 2011, the inventory of single-family homes for sale in Franklin this March reached a shockingly low 0.2 months – that’s less than one week of supply!

To give you context: six months of housing supply is considered a real estate market in equilibrium, while four months of available inventory is deemed a sellers’ market. One week of supply denotes a market nearing a lock-up. And don’t think you can go one or two towns over from Franklin and find a lot of homes to buy. The dearth of supply exists in most communities in the Bay State.

What home buyers should expect

What do current market conditions mean to you, if you’re in the market to buy a home?

If you’re planning on buying a home this year, be ready to stand in line outside open houses at new listings.  There are very few listings to look at and lots of buyers competing for them.  What this means is that you must have a very good real estate professional working on your behalf to find new listings for you and secure the purchase agreement for you very quickly – literally during the first few days the home comes on the market.  You should expect to pay at least asking price, if not significantly above asking price, if you seek to bid on homes brand new to the market that seem properly priced.

If a home seems over-priced to you or if it has been sitting unsold for awhile, you should have more negotiating leverage.

Below are select homes in Massachusetts that have been for sale for at least several weeks – some a lot longer:

What home sellers should expect

If you’re selling, what can you expect to experience in the current market?  Number one: your home is going to sell very quickly.

Additionally, if you price your home appropriately to the market, with a professional who knows what they’re doing and they market the listing really effectively online, what’s going to happen is that you’re going to have a lot of showings and a lot of competing bids for your home. 

A word to the wise: resist the temptation to over-price your property. Even in this market, if you grossly over-price you will not sell!

So if you price the home correctly, you’re likely going to be able to command more than the asking price for your home. It’s a great opportunity to cash out your home equity at historic high prices.

Today’s sellers in two camps

As I wrote near the start of this post, it’s a wonderful time to sell . . . if you have somewhere to go!

Massachusetts home sellers are split into two camps in 2021.  The first camp includes older sellers (retirees and those about to retire) along with sellers who already own a second home. These are the big winners in today’s market conditions. Those with second homes already have a place to move to, even if on an interim basis. And older sellers with grown children are in position to trade out to a lower cost area.  The sellers in this camp have a lot of equity and are free to sell. They should capitalize on today’s extremely high prices.

It’s a different matter for home sellers in the other camp. These are sellers who have a need to buy back into the same market in which they are selling.  They do not have ready access to interim housing. They often have school age kids or other community ties that make them need to stay local. These sellers are faced with the same low inventory and high prices confronting all other buyers. 

It’s a real challenge with today’s extremely low housing inventory to find your next home while you sell your current property. Many sellers in this camp get discouraged and end up staying put in their current homes, even though those homes have become too small for them or in some other way do not meet their current needs.

If you fall into this second camp, there are some strategies open to you that will enable you to successfully move. I would be happy to discuss these options with you.

Ask questions to Warren Reynolds

You can use the form below to ask any buying or seller questions to attorney and real estate broker Warren Reynolds. He’s here to help you!

(All Warren asks is that if you are already under contract with another real estate agent, please rely on the advice of that agent.)

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Are you a mother in the I-495 region of Massachusetts looking for support, companionship, or perhaps just some good ideas to help you raise your family while you pursue your career or educational goals?   There’s help close by!

WorkingMom Social Club (WMSC) is a Massachusetts non-profit dedicated to assisting and sustaining mothers and is ready to help you!

Emotional and practical support you can trust

You’ll find a lot of advice online, but how do you know what to trust?  And an online forum does little to provide companionship for parents who feel isolated or overwhelmed juggling childcare, work, and the pandemic.

That’s where being able to connect on an ongoing basis with local women dealing with the same child-rearing and life challenges you face can make a real difference! And you get a chance to socialize your young ones with other children and have some fun for yourself as well. (During the pandemic, WMSC’s playtime get-togethers have been, by necessity, limited.)

Educated professionals here to help you

The women who run WMSC are a high-powered group with diverse backgrounds and professions.

They know what it’s like to care for kids while dealing with work and all of life’s problems – especially in light of the hardship and uncertainty so many are experiencing due to the pandemic.

Events and activities

By focusing on families living in any of the communities in the I-495 area roughly between Milford and Taunton, WMSC seeks to make sure their get-togethers are physically accessible to all members.

You can learn more about WMSC’s activities here. (Note that, during the pandemic, WMSC has shifted most of its events to a virtual format like much of the rest of the world. The plan is to resume in-person events as social distancing restrictions ease.)

Joining WMSC

If you are interested in becoming a member of WMSC, you can join the club using the link at left or embedded in the image below.

If you have questions, please contact WMSC at:

workingmomsocialclub@gmail.com

Copyright ©02038.com

Elves seek donations of money instead of food items

This year, the Franklin Food Elves ask that you make cash donations. You can follow the hotlink in the image below to donate now.

In past annual food drives, the school-aged Elves focused their collection efforts on physically collecting nonperishable food items. But due to COVID-19 concerns, online giving is the safest method for supporting this very timely charity drive. (You may also have an opportunity to donate via personal check left outside your front door for Elf pick-up. Look for a purple envelope left at your house by your neighborhood Elf in coming days.)

Donations support the Franklin Food Pantry

All donations to the Food Elves benefit the Franklin Food Pantry.

The Food Panty’s website provides a compelling description of their service to the Franklin community:

The Franklin Food Pantry offers supplemental food assistance and household necessities to over 1,400 individuals. As a nonprofit organization, the Pantry depends entirely on donations, and receives no town or state funding. Between June 2019 and July 2020, 287,691, pounds of food was provided to clients. Other programs include the Weekend Backpack Program, Carts for Clients, Mobile Pantry, and holiday meal packages.

Significant increase in need for services

The Food Pantry reports a large increase in people seeking help over the last twelve months.

The increase in demand for food support very likely stems from the ongoing financial distress caused by the pandemic. As COVID-19 infection rates soar across the country as we approach the Holidays, food insecurity seems to be spreading and intensifying. So please donate to the Franklin Food Elves. These are very uncertain times for so many. Help from those who are in a position to provide it is needed!

Copyright ©02038.com

The Plastic Checkout Bag Prohibition Bylaw prohibits the “use of thin-film, single use plastic bags at checkout by all retailers in the Town of Franklin.”

The bylaw requires that all retailers who provide checkout bags to customers utilize only recyclable-paper, biodegradable or reusable bags.  (The bylaw provides definitions of each permitted bag.)

Examples of carryout bags allowed under new by-law

In announcing the plastic checkout bag prohibition, Franklin Town Administrator Jamie Hellen noted that Franklin has joined ranks with 58% of all Massachusetts cities and town (381 to date) that have enacted similar bag bans. 

Plastic bag bans or restrictions have been in effect statewide for some time in California and Oregon.  A statewide ban on single-use plastic checkout bags went into effect in New York on March 1, 2020.

Local bans have been enacted by many counties and municipalities in other states across the U.S.

The problem with plastics

Plastics are omnipresent in modern life.  They are durable and can be spun or molded into just about any form or shape needed.  Plastics are inert, making them highly appropriate for the creation of storage containers and bags because they do not interact with the material they store. But plastics do not biodegrade; they do not rot-away like organic matter.  Plastic can last decades and even hundreds of years in the environment without decaying.  What’s worse, plastics do photo-degrade.  Exposure to sunlight breaks down plastics into increasingly smaller and smaller pieces over time.

As explained by the above website created by the US Environmental Protection Agency, plastic waste is proliferating in the world’s oceans.  Many fish, birds, and marine mammals ingest small pieces of plastic and die each year.  As plastic photo-degrades, the process can release chemical pollution into the water, some of which is getting into the world’s food chain.  It’s a serious problem!

Thin-plastic carryout bags are so numerous

Thin-plastic checkout bags are handed out by US retailers in the hundreds of millions – some say billions – every year. By banning checkout bags, Franklin is seeking to eliminate at least part of the plastics pollution problem.  Paper bags and reusable bags would seem to be sensible and fairly painless replacements.

Wholesale club chains such as Sam’s Club, Costco, and BJ’s Wholesale (there’s a BJ’s in Franklin, MA) do not hand out any bags at all. 

So maybe banning single use checkout bags would be viewed as a no-brainer?

Pushback against bag bans

Maybe not!  Changes in law and government policy can have unanticipated negative consequences. So perhaps it is no surprise that plastic bag bans have been criticized and have encountered opposition. 

Some of the criticism about bag bans has come from the plastics industry itself, which is to be expected.  But some voices in academia and even environmentalism have also been raised against the bag bans.

In a 2017 doctoral dissertation entitled It’s Not Easy Being Green: Lessons from Disposable Carryout Bag Regulations, Rebecca L. Taylor makes a number of arguments against plastic bag bans.  Ms. Taylor claims to have proof that bag bans are counterproductive in that they hurt the environment more than checkout plastic bags have.  In the dissertation, the author asserts that consumers in California responded to various regulations banning or restricting the distribution of disposable checkout plastic by increasing their use (and disposal) of other types of plastic bags.  The dissertation also alleges that the creation and disposal of paper checkout bags ultimately have more harmful effects on the environment than plastic bags, and declared that the manufacture of reusable grocery bags produces serious negative environmental impacts.

Did Franklin make a mistake?

Some could argue that Franklin should not have gotten on the plastic bag ban bandwagon and let economic forces decide what checkout bags are available at Franklin retailers.  On the other hand, go shopping anywhere in town and you’ll collect a whole lot of plastic bags.  Kitchen closets and pantries can get full of them and the bags seem rarely to get recycled.  So the bag ban seems sensible and perhaps was long overdue.  People old enough to remember food shopping through the mid 1980s know that everyone did just fine without all those plastic bags!

©2020 02038.com

Local property tax surcharge with matching funds from the Commonwealth

One of the key features of the CPA is a requirement that participating cities and towns raise additional revenue via real property taxes (in the form of a surcharge of between one percent and three percent of the community’s real estate tax levy).  The CPA mandates that the surcharge monies raised are spent within the community for community preservation purposes, including building affordable housing, improving recreational resources, creating open space, and preserving historic buildings and other assets.

To encourage participation in the CPA, the Commonwealth contributes annual matching funds to participating municipalities. These matching funds currently amount to approximately one quarter of the annual revenues each city and town raises under the CPA program.

Benefits of CPA participation

The Community Preservation Coalition, an advocacy group supporting the CPA, maintains a website that highlights a selection of community preservation projects completed under the CPA.

While the recaps of these projects tell engaging stories accompanied by attractive photos, they may not adequately convey to Franklin residents the practical, local benefits of CPA participation.

How Medway has used CPA funding

A look at how the neighboring Town of Medway, MA, one town to the north of Franklin, has used CPA funding can demonstrate to Franklin residents in a more concrete way how the CPA can help enhance the livability of participating  communities.

Medway has spent CPA funding on many community preservation projects in the last decade (the projects shown above are just a sample).  The projects completed include new amenities at playgrounds, major improvements at town parks,  new tennis courts at the middle school, additional open space with walking trails, affordable housing units, and the rehabilitation of a historical building at risk of demolition.  

Unintended consequences of Proposition 2 1/2 create need for CPA

Of the 351 cities and towns in Massachusetts, half (176 as of early 2020) have chosen to participate in the CPA since it was implemented in 2001.  The primary motivation behind all those communities’ participation in the CPA seems to be the severe constraints put on municipal finances imposed by Proposition 2 1/2.

You can use the hotlink at right or in the image above to download the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities’ scathing analysis of the unintended consequences of Massachusetts’ Proposition 2 1/2.

Adopted in 1980 during a popular taxpayer revolt against what was seen as rampant over-taxation in “Taxachusetts”, Prop 2 ½ severely limits the ability of Massachusetts cities and towns to fund their operations via real property taxes.  The results of this cap on local taxation of real estate are described in the Center’s report as follows:

“By limiting Massachusetts localities’ only major source of revenue, Proposition 2 ½ has exacted a considerable cost — one that highlights the shortcomings of property tax revenue caps as a policy approach. The law has:

1. Arbitrarily constrained local governments’ ability to raise revenues without any consideration of the actual cost of providing services;

2. Made local governments heavily dependent on state aid, which tends to fluctuate with economic cycles and state policies (a particular problem in an economic downturn when state aid usually declines but the need for local services such as education and fire and police protection does not decline);

3. Exacerbated disparities between wealthier communities and poorer ones in access to quality local services, as many of the former have voted to override Proposition 2 ½’s revenue cap while the latter have generally had to adhere to it; and

4. Resulted in cuts to valued services rather than simply calling forth greater efficiency from local governments.”

Hence the interest in the CPA by cities and towns as a mechanism to raise some local tax revenue outside of the constraints of Prop 2 1/2.  The benefits of the CPA to taxpayers are that the CPA funds are kept under local control and can only be spent on preservation projects in the community.  State government bureaucrats in Boston do not determine how each participating community’s  CPA monies are spent.

How much CPA participation could cost Franklin taxpayers

The CPA contains complex directives on how the various surcharge amounts on a community’s real estate tax levy are calculated.  (These detailed directives are not reviewed in this post, but you can read the CPA law itself here and access the explanations provided by the Community Preservation Coalition here.)

To supplement his presentation to the Franklin Town Council earlier this year, Town Administrator Hellen created detailed spreadsheets showing how the CPA real estate tax surcharge would be applied in Franklin.  Below is a very simplified excerpt from Administrator Hellen’s spreadsheets:

As shown above, for a home in Franklin with the median assessed value of $460,400, the three alternative CPA surcharges would add the following amounts to the homeowner’s real property tax bill: $156.88 per year (3% surcharge); $104.58 per year (2% surcharge); and $52.29 (1% surcharge).  The amounts would be higher for Franklin homes assessed above $460K and lower for homes assessed below $460K. (Note that the first $100K of property value is exempt from the surcharge and that low-income homeowners do not pay the surcharge.)

Matching funds from the state

As an incentive for cities and towns to participate in the CPA, each year the Commonwealth of Massachusetts provides matching funds to participating communities.  The rules on how much each community receives are very elaborate and extensive and are not addressed in this post.  (Again, the CPA law can be found here and the website maintained by the Community Preservation Coalition has detailed information on this.)

The above chart was created by Franklin Town Administrator Jamie Hellen as part of his presentation to the Town Council.  It shows how much revenue Franklin would generate under each of the three surcharge alternatives and the amount of matching funds Franklin would receive from the state under each alternative. There may be an error in the chart regarding the amount of matching funds under the 1% surcharge (24% of $629,475 is $151,074, not $69,242).

Looking at the two charts together, you can see that if Franklin adopts a 2% surcharge, the town would have just nearly$1.6M in CPA funds (surcharge plus matching funds) and the cost of this to Franklin taxpayers would be $104.58 in extra real estate taxes per residence (at the $406,400 median assessed value).  A 3% surcharge would yield over $2.3M in CPA funds at a cost of an additional $156.88 in real estate taxes per median-assessed-value residence.

Pros and Cons of the CPA

The Pros:  Clearly, community preservation (in the form of spending for recreational resources, open space, preserving historic buildings and building affordable housing) is a worthy cause.  And some would say that the 1%, 2% and even the 3% surcharge is a small burden for taxpayers to bear, especially given that low-income homeowners are exempt from the surcharge’s extra taxation.  The fact that the state contributes matching funds (currently about 24% of the amount each community raises with its tax surcharge) creates an incentive for Franklin to join the ranks of cities and towns participating in the CPA. While Franklin does very well with its recreational resources without the CPA, the extra community preservation spending would help make Franklin even more attractive and livable.  The spending would bolster the appeal of Franklin to home buyers, supporting home values.

The Cons: Many families live paycheck to paycheck. A real property surcharge would be a significant extra expense for these households. And most taxpayers very likely have many other good uses for the money a surcharge would take out of their pockets. In addition, one could validly say that any additional tax revenue authorized in Franklin might better be spent on Franklin’s public schools, instead of on additional community preservation projects.

Whatever side of the CPA participation question you tend to favor, you need to keep the unintended consequences of Proposition 2 1/2 in mind.  Massachusetts cities and towns are so limited in tax revenue due to Prop 2 1/2 that important governmental functions on the local level have been starved of funding for decades.  The CPA offers Franklin a restricted and controlled way around the chokehold Prop 2 1/2 has on town revenues.  Franklin’s participation in the CPA deserves your careful consideration. 

©2020 02038.com

For million-dollar earners on a per capita basis, Franklin was ranked by the Globe as being on par with such affluent I-495/I-95 communities as Wrentham, Norfolk, Walpole, Mansfield and Holliston.  Pretty good company!    

Table shows ranking of communities

The Globe reported that Franklin was home to 71 tax-filers reporting incomes of one million dollars or higher in the 2017 tax year.  For Franklin on a per capita basis, that comes out to 2.16 filers in town reporting million-dollar incomes for every 1,000 Franklin residents.

The table above shows select Massachusetts communities ranked for million-dollar earners on a per capita basis.  Franklin is shown in red.  Other communities in the I-495/I-95 region are shown in blue for comparative purposes.  (You can view the full million-dollar-income ranking published by the Globe here.)

According to the Globe, just over 18,200 tax filers in Massachusetts for the 2017 tax year reported incomes of one million dollars or higher.  (The Globe noted that a portion of these filings likely were married couples filing jointly.)  2017’s million-dollar filings represented over a twelve percent increase in million-dollar filers compared to such filings in the 2016 tax year.

The Globe reported that the communities in Massachusetts with the highest per capita concentrations of million-dollar filers for the 2017 tax year were led by Weston (47 per 1,000 residents) with Dover coming in at number two (37 per 1,000), followed by Wellesley (34 per 1,000), Lincoln (24 per 1,000), and Manchester (23 per 1,000).

Massachusetts ranks near the top among US states for income, wealth

In many measures of wealth and income, Massachusetts ranks prominently among US states.

Citing 2015 data, MoneyRates.com ranks Massachusetts fourth in the US for states with the highest proportions of million-dollar earners. 

The Bay State is no laggard in terms of median household income either, according to USNews.com.

USNews.com ranked Massachusetts fourth in the nation for median household income.

US census data

US census information confirms a concentration of high incomes in much of the eastern half of the Commonwealth.

For Franklin, Census.gov reports that the town has a median income of $115,355 and a per capita income of $50,626 (each in 2018 dollars).

You can use the hyperlink at right or in the image below to access all the Census.gov demographic and economic data on Franklin, MA.

From the point of view of someone who has resided in Franklin, MA for over twenty years after having lived in several other regions of the United States, Franklin offers a refreshingly diverse population with a wide range of incomes.  If you are a prospective home purchaser, Franklin certainly deserves your consideration!  You can explore Franklin, MA here. 

©2020 02038.com

Previous incredABLE walk/runs in Franklin have drawn thousands of participants and attendees in past years, so this is an event of note!  Free parking is available.

Join in fundraising

HEMA is seeking sign-ups to form and join teams to participate in one of the races scheduled for May 19.

If you don’t want to walk or run in one of the races, please make a donation to this worthy cause.  And please come out and have some fun on May 19!

Learn more about Franklin, Massachusetts here.

Copyright ©2019 02038.com

This put Franklin High among the top 30 percent of all high schools in the Commonwealth.

Boston Magazine ranked Franklin HS much higher

Interestingly, Boston Magazine ranked Franklin High School much higher than 90th in the state when it issued its own survey of MA public high schools last October.

Boston Magazine judged Franklin High to be in the top 50 public high schools in the Commonwealth!  As I noted in my comments last October on the Boston Magazine school survey:

In placing forty-seventh in the survey, Franklin High was ranked on par with or better than such excellent public high schools serving Mansfield, Walpole, Natick and the regional high school serving Norfolk, Wrentham and Plainville (King Philip Regional).  Yet, as noted in a post published here a few years ago, Franklin, MA has a much lower property tax burden than most other I-495 communities with such excellent schools.

Why the disparity in the rankings?

The spread between rankings of 47th and 90th is very wide, especially for surveys completed within 6 months of each other!  Perhaps the different evaluations of Franklin High School in Franklin, MA is due to a local versus a national focus in the competing surveys. 

Boston Magazine looks only at high schools in Massachusetts while the US News and World Report organization purports to evaluate ALL public high schools in the US.

In describing its 2019 high school rankings, US News and World Report revealed that it used an all-new methodology to evaluate an over eightfold increase in the number of high schools surveyed (23,000 schools in 2019, compared to only 2,700 the previous year).  That’s a huge leap in coverage coupled with use of previously untested analytic tools, a combination that may very well expose the 2019 results to unintended error and distortion.

Copyright ©2019 02038.com

“ArtWeek” is something of a misnomer:  over the years, it has grown into ten days of events, shows, and activities in many participating Massachusetts communities.  

Franklin Cultural District site of many ArtWeek events

This will be the first ArtWeek in Franklin with The Franklin Cultural District officially in place.

Full schedule of events

You can download the ten day schedule of ArtWeek events in Franklin via the hotlink at left or in the image below.

“Taste of ArtWeek” craft and food festival in Franklin Saturday, April 27

The first weekend of ArtWeek in Franklin, MA gets off to a fun start with live music, food, drink, and a craft fair this Saturday, April 27. It’s called the “Taste of ArtWeek” and is a new event in town. You can access a comprehensive review of all the scheduled events for the Taste of Artweek here or in the hotlink embedded in the image below.

This new event in Franklin runs from 4 PM to 8 PM on Saturday, and it will be held at the Franklin Town Common and the adjacent Hayward Manor. 

It’s a grand opportunity to get outside, see and be seen, meet local crafters, and have a good time enjoying the warmer weather! You’ll be able to inspect and buy a variety of handmade crafts, decorations, jewelry, and artwork.  There will be a juried crafts exhibition, food trucks, and a beer garden. (Wine will also be available for purchase.) 

Purchase tickets on-line

You can purchase tickets for use at the food trucks and the beer garden on-line here or by following the hotlink in the image below.

Taste of Artweek supports good causes

The Taste of ArtWeek proceeds will benefit both the Random Smile Project charity and the Franklin Cultural Council.

If you can’t attend the Taste of Artweek event, you can make a donation to Random Smile here.  And you can contact the FCC here to get involved in this important support for the arts and culture in Franklin, Massachusetts.

Here’s hoping the Taste of ArtWeek is a big success and becomes an annual event in town!

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