Maria Pettis, Realtor (843) 860-3901

With the new stimulus plan just passed comes good news for First Time Homebuyers.  If you purchase a home between January 1, 2009 and December 1, 2009, you may be eligible for a tax credit up to $8000.  The amount is actually 10% of the purchase price of the home with a cap of $8000. Who exactly is eligible and what does "First ...

In the latest edition of my newsletter, "Summerville Scenes", I had written about how Dorchester County was set to pass a new ordinance pertaining to the burning of leaves and other yard debris.  After a good bit of heated debate, the ordinance was to limit leaf burning to those homeowners who had a third of an acre of more.  ...

While we only have about one month left of hurricane season to go, it wasn't a hurricane that recently made headlines here.  This past Friday, a bad rain storm dumped approximately 9 inches of rain on the Greater Charleston area.  This storm caused serious flooding in different areas stranding cars and damaging homes.  This ...

I passed an outdoor bulletin board a while ago in front of a real estate office (not mine ) and it said "Media Hype Sells Papers.  We Sell Houses." and I thought to myself "yes, that's true".  I actually watched a guy on the Today Show around that same time telling people to absolutely not buy a home ...

It seems like lately I've come across a lot of "first time buyers" and even some "first time sellers" who really didn't seem to know what to expect from working with an agent and just some of the basics of real estate.  So it seemed like a good idea to address some of the questions that these folks have come ...

Most people, including many first time buyers, are quite familiar with the things you should do before purchasing a home... you save some money for a down payment, closing costs and the like; you check your credit scores and clean up any credit issues if possible to improve those scores; you get pre-qualified; you start searching the net for that ...