Harleysville couple swept up in tide of home sales

It's been two years since Anthony "Chip" and Janet Foderaro first considered selling their Harleysville home of 22 years and buying something more accommodating to their "empty-nester" lifestyle.

It took them almost that long to find the house that would meet all their expectations.

On April 16, however, the Foderaros signed an agreement of sale with Erb Mascio Builders for a single house in Meadow Glen of Skippack, right outside Harleysville, for $485,000.

The Foderaros are part of a tidal wave of home-buying that has begun to wash over the sluggish real estate market in recent weeks - both new and existing homes.

That wave is, in large part, a creation of the rush for the federal tax credit being offered to qualified first-time buyers and homeowners who have not bought a primary residence in five years or more.

Deadline for sales agreements is Friday, and closings must occur by June 30.

The frenzy boosted March new-home sales 26.9 percent over February - a "grand-slam number," in the words of IHS Global Insight housing economist Patrick Newport, and also propelled existing-home transactions. The new-home jump was the biggest monthly percentage increase in 47 years.

The Foderaros, however, won't close by the tax-credit deadline. It was lifestyle, not a $6,500 credit, that launched their search.

"We didn't exactly want 55-plus, but we did want to live somewhere where the yard was taken care of," said Janet, 60, pointing out that their present house, built in 1969, rests on not quite two acres of former farmland.

They bought it when Chip, 55, a Pennsylvania native and diagnostic radiologist at Grand View Hospital in Sellersville, finished his residency at the University of Iowa and they moved here in 1988.

"It was close to Sellersville," said Janet, who grew up on a farm in Nebraska and was trained as a nurse, "and he needed to be no more than a half hour from work."

The house, too, no longer fit their needs.

Their son, Andrew, is away in medical school, and daughter Laurelyn works with the United Nations in Washington.

The couple, married for 29 years, also have a house in the Poconos, and "we're spending a lot of weekends there," said Janet, who is chairwoman of the board of Peaceful Living, a faith-based organization in Harleysville that provides services for those with developmental disabilities and their caregivers.

Nevertheless, the decision to leave a house where so much life has been lived "takes a while," she said. "Emotionally, it's difficult to think about moving. There are times that you think, Well, maybe we could continue to live here."

The Foderaros had made some changes over the years that would make it possible to stay, including the first-floor master-bedroom addition that also accommodated visits by Janet's sister and brother, both of whom have multiple sclerosis, and aging parents.

Still, in 2008, they told Weichert agent Diane Williams, who was the listing agent on their house 22 years ago (and had sold it to the previous owner as well), to start looking for a replacement.

Whether it was a new or existing home didn't matter, as long as it had a first-floor master, much smaller yard, and was nearby.

Initially, what they found, said Janet, was a lot of overpriced houses and not much where they wanted to live.

"We're glad we waited," she said.

Still in no hurry, they would have waited longer until Janet happened to drive past Meadow Glen.

"I called Diane to look with me," she said. "While they looked too small on the outside, they were much larger on the inside. The layout was just what we needed; there was a first-floor master and a walkout basement, which I thought would make it easier for my brother and sister when they visit."

Unlike many 55-plus homes, which are town houses or quads, "these were singles, and I didn't want anything that didn't have windows on one side," she said.

Today's market is more accommodating to buyers, Janet said.

"There are a lot of options, and the builders appear willing to do everything you want," she said. "When you've lived in the same house for 22 years, it can be hard trying to envision what the new house should look like, but we have time."

She also thinks today's market is more accommodating to selling a house.

"We're not in a hurry," Janet said, "but the house across the street sold in less than a week, and neighbors and people we know seem to be more confident in the market now than they were when we started looking."

That doesn't mean the Foderaros aren't getting ready to move.

"There's a Dumpster in the driveway," she said.