(Sept. 10, 2025) The battle for a local option real estate transfer fee has risen from the dead as communities across Massachusetts are once again returning to Beacon Hill and urging the Legislature to give them one more tool to help attack the intensifying affordable housing crisis.
Lawmakers, school superintendents, law enforcement officials, real estate professionals and health care workers from Martha’s Vineyard, to Somerville, to Concord renewed their support Tuesday for a policy the Legislature swept aside last session that would let localities place a fee on high-cost real estate transfers.