Our daughter, Gabby, is finish up the first year of her doctorate program at the University of Maryland studying and researching oceanic and atmospheric
sciences. She was so excited to move into her first apartment in Washington DC! She had never lived in a city before and couldn’t wait to be in the middle of everything.
Just last week, she called feeling very homesick for Maine. She hadn’t realized how much of a cultural difference there would be living there – but of course, there is! She said she misses running into nice people as she goes about her day. She doesn’t really know any of her neighbors, there is so much non-stop city noise and traffic, and it takes so much effort to run even the smallest of errands. She is still such a Maine girl at heart and misses being able to walk to a local beach, visiting with our neighbors on the sidewalk, strolling through Hinkley Park, or zipping around town running her errands and greeting all the people she knows as she does.
I’m a Mainah too – born in Bar Harbor, raised Downeast and have lived in South Portland for more than 35 years. Of course, we all expect changes… and changes there have been! During covid, we experienced a huge influx of buyers coming from out of state and that is continuing two years later. One of our many buyers has made offers on 4 homes in 4 different towns. Unfortunately, they’ve lost out on every one of them, but there has been a common theme in all of these cases. Each time we’ve been beat by someone from out of state who did not need financing, they had cash, and they had no contingencies on their offers – no inspections and no appraisals! It is so hard to compete with cash and no contingencies!
With so many buyers coming “from away” it is inevitable that things here will change too. They are drawn to Maine for its beauty, environment and culture, but by coming here, they change it. Well, I love Maine just the way it is, and I don’t ever want to leave so I’m going to “Double Down” on being nice and make every effort to maintain the qualities we all love about this area. I’ll be waving to people as I’m driving, saying “hello” to people I pass on the street, holding doors, chatting with people in the checkout lines, supporting all our great community events and checking in with my neighbors more often. We live in such a beautiful setting but what makes this area truly beautiful is the people and our sense of community. As we move into warmer weather, I can’t wait to get out and enjoy the activities that make this area so great. I hope to see you out there! I’ll be the one waving!