December 11, 2023
Vickie Landis Rentsel is to be honored at an upcoming Phantoms Hockey Game
Vickie will be honored on December 27, 2023. This recognition is part of the Phantoms’ ongoing Hometown Heroes initiative, which singles out local military heroes during games at the PPL Center.
Vickie Landis-Rentsel joined the Air Force in 1986. She served for the 33rd Medical Service Squadron at McGuire Airforce Base and later the 21st at Patrick Airforce Base. Even after an honorable discharge in 1994, the training and knowledge she gained as a Mental Health Specialist remained foundational to her work.
For over 33 years, Vickie has grown a real estate business that caters to Eastern Pennsylvania, covering Philadelphia to the Lehigh Valley. Because of her real estate profession, Vickie has been privileged to be able to remain committed to serving her community by providing free mentorship, financial aid, and housing assistance to individuals who have been affected by trauma.
In 2021, Vickie established REST Connection, a non-profit organization that offers services to at-risk women, enabling them to achieve social and economic independence. To learn more about REST Connection and join Vickie on her mission to help women at risk, visit restconnection.org.
To purchase tickets, please visit our fundraising link: https://fevo-enterprise.com/event/Restconnection. $5 from each ticket sale will go back to REST Connection!
The mission of REST Connection is to provide direct services to vulnerable and at-risk women to empower them to achieve social and economic independence by connecting them with the tools, services, and support needed to equip them to give back to their community. They embrace any woman at risk who is committed to discovering and embracing her full potential by embarking on a guided journey to break destructive cycles and develop the skills and mindset needed to thrive in life, relationships, and her community. While they are not equipped to support women who are in active addiction or have untreated mental health disorders, we do partner with organizations that provide those front-line services to prepare the woman to graduate into our program.
The mission of the Vickie Landis Rentsel Team at Keller Williams Realty Group is to provide each client with the information, resources and support services needed to make wise, informed decisions regarding all types of real estate transactions. With more than 33 years of real estate experience, Vickie has developed proven systems and strategies that simplify the complicated maze of buying and selling real estate. When working with them, you get the combined expertise, energy, and ingenuity of a team of the area's premier Realtors.
For the past two years, a lot of people have been waiting on the housing market to do one specific thing: drop rates dramatically and "unfreeze." That was the plan for buyers and sellers alike. I'll move when rates come down. That big drop never fully arrived. And the market changed anyway. It didn't unfreeze. It thawed — slowly. Halfway through 2026, buyers in many markets have more homes to choose from, more time to decide, and more room to negotiate than they've had in years. Sellers are adjusting to a slower, more selective market. It's not a perfectly balanced market everywhere. But compared to the pandemic-era bidding wars, and the frozen, locked-up market that followed them, it looks a lot more balanced. Nobody rings a bell when a market becomes more negotiable. Booms and crashes make headlines; a market quietly returning to normal doesn't. So consider this your mid-year bell: here's what the first half of 2026 actually tells us, and what it means whether you're buying, selling, or staying put. More Homes, More Time, More Conversation Start with what changed. There are meaningfully more homes on the market than during the low-inventory years: about 1.56 million listings nationally as of June, or 4.6 months of supply.¹ That's not a glut, and the growth has been leveling off as some would-be sellers step back rather than chase the market. But for buyers who spent years picking from slim inventory, it's a real difference. And the market isn't frozen. Sales bounce around from month to month, but they're running ahead of where they were a year ago.¹ People are moving without the dramatic rate drop everyone was waiting on. The bigger shift is in how deals come together. Negotiation is a standard part of the process again. Nearly half of sellers, 46% in May, gave buyers some form of concession, a record for that month.² Price reductions are far more common than they were during the frenzy. For buyers, that's a signal of how negotiable this market is, not necessarily a problem with the home. Inspections, repairs, closing costs, timing: these are conversations again, not sacrifices you make to win a bidding war. More negotiation doesn't mean buyers control every market. A well-priced home in a tight area can still sell fast, sometimes with competition. What it means for you: if you're buying, the list price is no longer the whole conversation. A reduced price is often an invitation to look closer, not a reason to stay away. If you're selling, the lesson runs the other way: strategy matters more than optimism. The goal is to price right on day one so you never need the cut. Homes that reduce are usually correcting a pricing decision the market already voted on. Rates Are No Longer the Only Story Mortgage rates spent the first half of the year drifting rather than diving. The average 30-year fixed rate was 6.49% in mid-July, a shade better than the 6.72% from a year ago, but nowhere near the dramatic relief people were holding out for.³ The market improved anyway. Affordability has quietly been getting better. Buying power stretches a little further than it did a year ago, as income growth outpaces home-price growth in most of the country.¹ Not dramatically. Cumulatively. And the people transacting in 2026 aren't necessarily the ones who timed the market perfectly. They're the ones whose lives changed: a new job, a growing family, a downsize, a divorce, a retirement, a relocation. Life decisions, not rate decisions, are driving moves again. Waiting has a cost too. I've watched plenty of buyers hold out for a rate that never arrived while their needs kept changing, like the family that outgrew their space two years ago, or the retiree maintaining a house that stopped making sense. If the only thing keeping you on the sidelines is a number, it's worth running the math on what waiting is actually costing you. What it means for you: rates still shape affordability, but they're not the whole plot anymore. Price, concessions, inspection terms, timing, and the right property all shape the outcome too. You can't control the rate — you can control almost everything you negotiate around it. What the National Numbers Can Miss The national market barely exists. Conditions differ sharply by region, price point, and property type. Some markets have tipped genuinely toward buyers, with more listings, longer timelines, and real leverage. Others remain stubbornly tight, with limited supply and quick sales. Even price direction is diverging: some regions are still posting solid annual gains while others have flattened out.¹ Two buyers with similar budgets can have completely opposite experiences depending on where and what they're shopping for. The national median price tells the same story in one number: $440,600 in June, up just 1.8% from a year ago.¹ A modest gain, but that one number is an average of markets moving in different directions. This is exactly where the gap between the headline and your street gets expensive. What it means for you: national headlines tell you the direction of the market. They can't tell you what your home is worth, what your competition looks like, or how much negotiating room exists in your neighborhood. Only a local read can. What It Means for You — Buyers, Sellers, and the Staying-Put A more balanced, more local market rewards preparation over timing. What that looks like depends on whether you're buying, selling, or staying put. If you're buying: you have more choice and, in many markets, more leverage than you've had in years. Use the time this market gives you: inspect thoroughly, negotiate genuinely, and compare concessions, not just list prices. A seller-paid rate buydown or closing-cost credit can sometimes do more for your monthly payment than a modest price cut. First-time buyers are finding more entry points than they have in years, making up 33% of June's buyers¹, but affordability still requires discipline. More options doesn't mean easy. If you're selling: you can absolutely still win in this market. But pricing right from day one, presenting well, and expecting negotiation are now the job description. "Testing the market" with an ambitious price costs real time and real money. The homes that sit are usually the ones that priced for 2021. If you're staying put: a calmer market is a good moment for a low-stakes check-in. What's your home worth now? What does your equity look like? Does this home still fit your life? No urgency, just awareness. The forecast for the second half of the year calls for modestly better sales, not fireworks⁴, which means this planning window stays open. Across all three: the second half of the year favors people who know their local numbers, not people waiting for a national signal. Balance doesn't pick winners. Preparation does. The Second Half Belongs to the Prepared That's the mid-year picture: more choice, steadier rates, more negotiation, and conditions that are sharply local. For the first time in a while, this is a market you can plan in rather than react to. The national story is the easy part — you just read it. The part you can't Google is what it means on your street, for your home, on your timeline. If you're wondering what this market means for your specific situation, reach out. Whether you're thinking about buying, selling, or just want to know where your home stands, that's exactly the kind of conversation I'm happy to have, no pressure attached. Sources 1. Existing-Home Sales Report, June 2026 — National Association of REALTORS® 2. 46% of Home Sellers Gave Concessions to Buyers in May — Redfin 3. Primary Mortgage Market Survey, July 9, 2026 — Freddie Mac 4. NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun: Home Sales Expected to Improve in Second Half of 2026 — National Association of REALTORS®
When most people picture negotiating on a home, they picture one number: the list price. You offer somewhere under the asking price, the seller counters, you settle in the middle, and whoever gives up the most ground "loses." For a lot of buyers, that back-and-forth over the sale price is the negotiation. It's only a fraction of it. The price is the headline. The real negotiation happens in the terms underneath it, and right now those terms are where the money is. Buyers have more room to ask than they've had in years. The market has tilted in their favor, and it's showing up at the closing table: in 2025, 62.2% of buyers paid below the list price, and the typical below-list buyer saved 7.9% — about $31,592 — the biggest discount in over a decade.¹ So here's what actually separates the buyers who come out ahead. It isn't the ones who push hardest on the price. It's the ones who understand everything that's on the table, and know which things are worth asking for. The Price-Only Trap It's easy to assume a seller cares about one thing: the highest possible number. In practice, most care about more than that. They care about certainty, meaning whether the deal will actually close. They care about timing. They care about whether your financing will hold together or fall apart three weeks in. That matters for you, because it means you have more to work with than a single figure. A buyer who treats the offer as a package — price, terms, timing, and risk all together — can often create a better outcome than a buyer who just hammers on price and calls it a day. That's why a clean, well-structured offer can beat a higher one: to the right seller, the certainty is worth more than the extra dollars. So before you anchor on a number, widen the lens. Here's what else is on the table. The Money Levers Beyond the Price Some of the most valuable things you can ask for never touch the sale price at all. They change what you actually pay out of pocket. Start with a seller concession. This is money the seller agrees to credit you at closing, most often to cover part of your closing costs, which typically run 2% to 5% of the purchase price.² Rather than cutting the sale price, the seller puts cash toward those costs, lowering what you need to bring on closing day. It's worth asking for any time your upfront cash is the tightest constraint, which for a lot of buyers it is. And it's far from a long shot right now: about 44% of sellers recently gave buyers a concession of some kind, close to the highest share on record.³ A rate buydown is one of the least understood levers, and one of the most valuable. When you buy down the rate, someone pays the lender an upfront sum in exchange for a lower mortgage interest rate. In a negotiation, you ask the seller to be the one who pays it. A buydown can be permanent, lowering your rate for the life of the loan, or temporary. A common version, the "2-1 buydown," cuts two percentage points off your rate the first year and one point the second, then settles at the full rate. Builders have leaned on this hard: 64% were offering incentives like buydowns and closing-cost help earlier this year.⁴ It's worth understanding why this can beat a price cut outright. Take $10,000 off the sale price and your monthly payment barely moves, maybe a few dollars on a 30-year loan. Put that same $10,000 toward buying down your rate, and you feel it in every payment for as long as you own the home. It's the same money out of the seller's pocket, but a far bigger result in yours. The Inspection Is Your Second Negotiation Most buyers treat the home inspection as a hurdle to clear: pass it, and you move on. It's better understood as a second negotiation, and the leverage is usually built in, because an inspection on almost any home turns up something worth addressing. When it does, you generally have two options. You can ask the seller to make the repairs before closing, or ask for a credit instead so you can handle the work yourself afterward. The credit is often the cleaner win. You control the contractor, the timeline, and the quality of the work, instead of depending on a seller's rushed, last-minute fix. A few rules of thumb. Focus on what genuinely matters, meaning health, safety, and the big-ticket systems like the roof, HVAC, or foundation, rather than nickel-and-diming every cosmetic flaw. Consider asking for a home warranty to cover the things that tend to break after you move in. And treat the report as a planning tool, not just a bargaining chip. A fifteen-year-old water heater isn't a reason to walk away. It's a heads-up that helps you budget. Terms and Timeline: The Wins That Aren't About Money One of the most powerful levers costs you nothing: flexibility. To a seller, time is often worth as much as dollars. Say the sellers need a few extra weeks in the home because their next place isn't ready. Offering a rent-back, which lets them stay on for a short period after closing, can make your offer the one they choose even over a higher bid. Or maybe they need to close fast, and you're in a position to deliver. The closing date, the possession date, the length of your contingency periods, even how your earnest money is structured: all of it is something you can shape. The strategic move is simple. Give the seller the timeline they need, and you'll often get the terms you want in return. What Actually Comes With the House This is the simplest ask of all, and the one buyers most often forget to make: what physically stays with the house. Appliances, window treatments, the mounted TVs, the washer and dryer, sometimes even furniture or the patio set you admired during the showing. A lot of it is negotiable. The law draws a line between fixtures, which are generally included, and personal property, which generally isn't, and that line is exactly where a quick ask can pay off. One rule matters above the rest: get every extra written into the contract. A friendly "sure, we'll leave the fridge" during a showing means nothing if it isn't on paper. And if there's something you want, ask for it. The worst answer you'll get is no. How to Actually Use the Whole Menu Knowing what's negotiable is the easy part. Using it well is what turns a list of asks into a better deal. The buyers who succeed don't fire off every possible demand at once. They lead with what the seller values most, group their requests thoughtfully, and avoid the death-by-a-thousand-cuts approach that makes a seller dig in. Above all, they read the seller's real motivation, and that's where a skilled agent earns their keep. It's no accident that 88% of buyers work with an agent, and that the help they value most is negotiating the terms of the deal.⁵ A calm, well-prepared buyer with a clear strategy almost always does better than an aggressive one throwing elbows. The goal isn't to beat the seller. It's to structure a deal that works for both sides, and to make sure you're not leaving value on the table you never knew was there. If you're getting ready to buy, this is exactly the kind of thing worth talking through before you write an offer. I'm glad to walk through everything you could be asking for in your particular situation. No pressure, just a clear picture so you can make a confident decision. Sources Redfin — Homebuyers Are Scoring the Biggest Discounts in 13 Years Redfin — What Are Closing Costs and How Much Will You Pay? Redfin — 44% of Home Sellers Are Giving Concessions to Buyers NAHB / WTOP — Builder Incentives and Rate Buydowns NAR — 2025 Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers
If you've spent any time on real estate TikTok in the last few years, you've probably seen the house hacking pitch. Buy a property, rent part of it out, let your tenants cover the mortgage. Live for free. Build wealth while you sleep. It sounds like the kind of thing that works great in a YouTube thumbnail and falls apart in real life. And honestly? Sometimes it does. But here's what those videos usually get right even when they oversell the outcome: housing costs have outpaced wage growth by a wide margin, and for the right buyer, generating income from a property can make ownership viable when it otherwise wouldn't be. The strategy is real. The "living for free" part is just the clickbait version of it. In 2026, the smarter question isn't whether house hacking works — it's whether it's the right fit for you, your market, and your numbers. Here's what that actually looks like. What House Hacking Actually Means House hacking is straightforward in concept: buy a primary residence and generate income from it to help offset the cost of owning it. The definition is that simple. The execution has a lot of range. The term got a lot of breathless social media attention a few years ago—often paired with promises of "living for free" or "having your tenants pay your mortgage." That framing wasn't entirely wrong, but it oversimplified things in ways that set some buyers up for disappointment. In 2026, the more useful way to think about house hacking isn't about eliminating a housing payment. It's about engineering a more manageable one. If a rental unit on a property generates $1,600 a month and the mortgage is $3,800, that $2,200 net payment might be very achievable where $3,800 wasn't. That's the real value—not a free house, but a door that was otherwise closed, now open. The Most Common Ways Buyers Are Doing It The ADU Boom Accessory Dwelling Units — often called ADUs, casitas, in-law suites, or backyard cottages — have become the gold standard of modern house hacking. An ADU is a secondary living unit on the same lot as a primary home. It might be a detached structure in the backyard, a converted garage, or a basement with its own entrance. ADUs have exploded in popularity for a simple reason: they're increasingly legal in places where they weren't before, and both the financing and the rental markets now support them. Fannie Mae made a significant policy update that took full effect in March 2026, allowing buyers to count projected ADU rental income toward their qualifying income when applying for a mortgage.¹ Specifically, lenders can now include ADU rental income on one-unit, owner-occupied purchase transactions, up to 30% of the borrower's total qualifying income.¹ That's a meaningful change. It means a buyer looking at a home with an ADU can leverage that unit's income potential before they ever sign a lease with a tenant. Multi-Generational Living House hacking isn't always about renting to strangers. For a growing share of buyers, it means sharing a home — and the costs that come with it — with family. Multi-generational home buying is sizable part of the market, with 14% of all home purchases nationally being multi-generational in the last year.² Gen X buyers led the charge, with 19% choosing multi-generational homes, and it's not hard to understand why.² That generation is often caught supporting both aging parents and adult children at the same time, and a home designed to accommodate multiple adults under one roof can solve several problems at once: caretaking, privacy, and cost. Among multi-generational buyers, 41% said the primary reason for their purchase was to care for or support aging parents — the highest share since tracking began in 2015.³ Another 23% said their main motivation was simply to spend more time with their parents.³ This isn't niche behavior. It reflects a real demographic and economic reality that's reshaping how families think about homeownership. The Classic Multi-Family Buying a duplex, triplex, or small multi-family property and living in one unit while renting the others is the original form of house hacking — and it still works. FHA loans allow buyers to purchase properties with up to four units with as little as 3.5% down, as long as the buyer occupies one unit as their primary residence. Eligible veterans can go even further with a VA loan, which requires no down payment at all on qualifying multi-unit properties. And for buyers who don't fit either of those boxes, Freddie Mac's Home Possible program allows qualified buyers to put as little as 3% down. The financing options for owner-occupied multi-family are genuinely more accessible than most buyers realize. For those willing to share a property line with their tenants, the income potential is typically higher than an ADU, and the strategy is time-tested.⁴ The Real Math Here's the truth about house hacking in 2026: the "living for free" narrative that circulated on social media was never universally achievable, and it's even rarer now. Interest rates have stabilized but remain elevated compared to the pandemic-era floor. Home prices, while not climbing at the same frenetic pace, are not meaningfully lower in most markets. Cash-flowing a property from day one — generating enough rental income to cover the entire mortgage — requires either very favorable market conditions or a large down payment. That's not a reason to dismiss the strategy. It's a reason to recalibrate expectations. The goal in 2026 isn't to eliminate a housing payment. It's to reduce it to something sustainable. In many cases, a well-chosen house hack turns an unaffordable property into a manageable one — and that's a significant win. Buyers who run realistic numbers, factor in vacancy periods and maintenance costs, and approach the strategy with patience tend to do well. Buyers who chase optimistic projections tend to struggle. Lenders have adjusted, too. The new Fannie Mae ADU income guidelines come with documentation requirements and a cap on how much of that income can be counted.¹ This is a reasonable safeguard, not a barrier — it filters out the wishful math and keeps the qualifying process grounded in real market data. Who This Works Best For First-time buyers facing an affordability gap. If income doesn't support the mortgage on a home that checks all the boxes, a property with rental potential can bridge that gap — both by reducing the net monthly payment and, in the case of ADU-eligible properties, by improving what a lender will approve in the first place. The sandwich generation. Gen X buyers, who are often supporting aging parents while still raising or housing adult children, have more motivation than any other group to maximize what a home does for them.² A property designed for multi-generational living isn't just a financial strategy; it's a practical solution to a real caregiving reality. NAR research shows that among Gen X multi-generational buyers, households with three or more income earners are increasingly common, which further strengthens the financial case.³ Future investors learning the ropes. Living in a property while managing a rental unit is one of the best ways to learn real estate investing without the full risk exposure of a standalone investment property. A buyer who spends two or three years in a house hack and then moves to their next home can keep the first property as a full-time rental — with tenant management experience already under their belt. What to Know Before Getting Started Zoning and local regulations are non-negotiable. ADU legality, short-term rental rules, and multi-family zoning vary dramatically by city and neighborhood. What's allowed three blocks away may not be allowed on the property being considered. Unpermitted units create liability headaches that outlast the savings they generate. Doing things by the book from the start isn't just the right approach — it's the only one that holds up over time. Run conservative numbers. Plan for vacancies. Budget for maintenance. Use realistic rent estimates based on comparable properties in the area, not best-case scenarios. If the math still makes sense when accounting for a month or two of vacancy each year plus routine repairs, it's a solid plan. If it only works at 100% occupancy with top-of-market rents, it's a risk. Be honest about lifestyle fit. Sharing a property with tenants — whether strangers renting an ADU or family members in a multi-generational setup — comes with real tradeoffs. It requires a certain temperament and a willingness to handle the occasional uncomfortable conversation. Buyers who go in with clear boundaries and realistic expectations tend to thrive. Those who underestimate the interpersonal dimension often don't. The Bottom Line House hacking is no longer a fringe idea for real estate investors. It's a mainstream strategy that serious buyers in 2026 are using to navigate a market that doesn't hand out easy answers. The fundamentals of homeownership — building equity, gaining stability, and creating long-term wealth — still hold. House hacking simply acknowledges that the path to those benefits sometimes requires a little more creativity with how a property is used. Every neighborhood is different. Zoning rules, rental demand, and property potential vary widely, and the right house hack for one buyer might look completely different for another. If you're wondering whether you're the right fit for this strategy, that's exactly the conversation worth having. Reach out and let's dig into what it could actually look like for your market and your numbers. Sources: 1. Fannie Mae / Pennymac Announcement 26-25: https://corr.pennymac.com/non-delegated-announcements/announcement-26-25 2. NAR 2026 Home Buyers and Sellers Generational Trends Report: https://www.nar.realtor/research-and-statistics/research-reports/home-buyer-and-seller-generational-trends 3. NAR Economists' Outlook – Multi-Generational Homes: https://www.nar.realtor/blogs/economists-outlook/making-extra-room-at-the-table-multi-generational-trends 4. Redfin – House Hacking: What Is It, and Why Is It So Popular?: https://www.redfin.com/blog/house-hacking/
