I sat down with Dusty Allen, a global real estate advisor with Sierra Sotheby's International Realty based in South Lake Tahoe. Dusty works both the California and Nevada sides of the lake. He is also the current president of the South Tahoe Association of Realtors, which gives him a view of the local market that most agents never get. We talked about how he ended up in Tahoe, what it actually means to advocate for a buyer, and what anyone thinking about a short-term rental i

Luxury Realtor Harmony Steingrebe and I break down the costly mistakes relocation buyers make in Reno-Tahoe, from snow load and golf seasons to Nevada's property tax advantage. It happens often. A buyer finds a gorgeous home on Zillow, the price looks right, and they are ready to write an offer from 2,000 miles away. Then they move in and learn what the listing never told them: the driveway is an ice rink from November to April, or the golf course closes for half the year. To

Christy Morrison has sold more than 1,000 homes in the Tahoe Truckee area over the past 26 years, and today she runs Home and Slate Real Estate, a brokerage serving Truckee, Tahoe, and Northern Nevada. I recently had Christy on the Reno-Tahoe Real Estate Insider podcast, and she shared her story, how she helps buyers and sellers, what she offers agents, and her take on where the market is headed this fall. Here are the highlights. From Ski Racer to Real Estate Agent Christy's

If you're on the fence about buying a home in Northern Nevada right now, you're not alone. I recently sat down with Lindsey Pena, a realtor who has worked the Reno-Sparks market for about 14 years, to talk through what buyers are actually facing right now and how to think about timing. Here's what we covered. Where Rates and Prices Stand Today Before the recent Iran conflict, the average 30-year fixed rate was sitting around 5.99%. Today it's closer to the mid to high sixes,

If you're thinking about moving to the Reno-Tahoe area but you're not sure how to buy a new home before your current one sells, you're not alone. It's one of the most common questions I get as a mortgage lender, and it's usually followed by the same worry: "I don't want to end up with two mortgage payments." I recently sat down with Tristan Lipschutz of Compass Real Estate, and she flipped the script and interviewed me on this exact topic. Here's a breakdown of the five strat

If you are thinking about buying a lakefront property in Lake Tahoe, there is a lot more to understand than the usual real estate checklist. I recently sat down with Brendan Boyle of The Moore Team, one of the top lakefront real estate teams in the Tahoe Basin, to talk through what buyers and sellers actually need to know before they make a move on the water. Brendan and his team, which includes Mark Moore, Kimberly Boyle, and Monica Smith, specialize in lakefront and lake vi

If you have been thinking about buying property in Incline Village, the next twelve months may be the window before prices move again. I recently sat down with Brad Buxton, a Compass Real Estate agent based in Incline Village. His answer was not the usual "the lake is beautiful" pitch. It came down to three forces converging at once: a wave of new tech wealth, a generation of boomers finally ready to sell, and a limited supply of homes that cannot be replaced. The AI Boom Is

If you are buying a home in Lake Tahoe, Truckee, or anywhere around the basin, insurance is one of the biggest hurdles you will run into during your transaction. I have seen deals get delayed and buyers get caught off guard simply because they did not start shopping for a policy early enough. I sat down with Anmol Grewal, an independent insurance broker with Goosehead Insurance who specializes in high wildfire risk areas like Lake Tahoe, to walk through everything buyers need

Lake Tahoe sits across two states, five counties, and 72 miles of shoreline, and that geography is the first thing most buyers underestimate. I recently talked with Sean and Aimee McDonald, real estate agents who cover both sides of the lake and all of northern Nevada, about how the counties around Tahoe differ and what that means for anyone thinking about buying here. Here's a breakdown of each one. Why the County Matters More Than People Think Before getting into the counti

If you are thinking about building a custom home in the Lake Tahoe or Truckee region, there are a few things you need to understand before you buy your lot. I recently sat down with Dave Gove, a real estate professional based in Truckee who spent years working in construction before moving into real estate, to break down why building up here is so expensive, what causes projects to go over budget, and an alternative that more buyers are choosing today. Dave is not your typica

I recently sat down with Meredith Martin, a real estate agent who has spent 32 years working both the San Francisco Bay Area and the Reno-Tahoe market. She never planned on a career in real estate. But she got her start in 1994 with a company called Lofts Unlimited, selling live-work warehouses in San Francisco's South of Market neighborhood during the dot-com boom, and she never left the business. That early experience shaped how she still operates today. She was working wit

If you're thinking about buying property in Lake Tahoe, the first thing to understand is that you're not really buying a house. You're buying into a lifestyle. That was the core message I heard loud and clear from Ming Poon, a top producing real estate agent who has called Tahoe home since 2002. I sat down with Ming to talk through what it actually looks like to buy around the lake, from the West Shore all the way to Incline Village and out into Truckee. He's spent over 20 ye

Affordability is the number one question on every Reno homebuyer's mind right now. Rates are higher than they were a few years ago, prices haven't slowed down much, and it's easy to feel priced out before you've even started looking. To cut through the noise, we sat down with Yvonne Ethridge, a Reno realtor who has closed over 110 transactions in the last five years (for context, roughly 75% of agents nationwide didn't close a single deal in 2025). Yvonne works with first-tim

Everyone wants to sell you on why you should move to South Lake Tahoe. I sat down with Ryan Smith, a Compass real estate agent licensed in California and Nevada who focuses on the South Shore, from Stateline and Zephyr Cove through South Lake, to talk through the top 8 reasons someone might NOT want to buy a home here. Ryan's own path to Tahoe says a lot about why he is the right person to ask this question. He grew up visiting as a kid and always dreamed of living here. When

If you want to understand how Mitchell Ross approaches real estate, start with the story of his first deal. It was 2017. Mitchell had just gotten his license and was shadowing a mentor at an open house. A couple walked in, said they were not really interested in the property, but mentioned a condo they had been eyeing nearby. The mentor sent Mitchell over alone. His hands were shaking when he opened the lockbox. He had never done it before. He got them in. They bought the con

If you want to understand what it actually takes to build one of the most respected real estate practices in the Greater Reno area, you have to start at the bottom. And for Justin Hertz, the bottom was 2010. Justin and his wife Mindy had just declared bankruptcy. They had a two-year-old daughter, a mountain of debt from a failed small business, and no clear path forward. Justin had moved to Reno from San Diego back in 2005 to run an online pet products business. For years it

Lake Tahoe is one of the most breathtaking places in the world. So is Hawaii. But what happens when the people who make these destinations so special can no longer afford to live there? That is the question at the heart of a recent conversation on the Reno-Tahoe Real Estate Insider podcast featuring Jena Lanini, a Coldwell Banker real estate agent born and raised in the Lake Tahoe area, now based in Reno and working across both the Reno and Lake Tahoe markets. What followed w

When you meet Michelle Hammond, you immediately sense someone who has lived through hardship and come out the other side with a deep well of resilience and purpose. As a consistently top 10% real estate agent across the entire Northern Nevada Regional MLS, Michelle has built a thriving career in just five years. But her path to success started long before she earned her real estate license, and it began in some of the most difficult circumstances imaginable. Early Roots in No

If you are thinking about buying a luxury home in Reno, Nevada, you might be surprised to learn that Reno is one of the best golf destinations in the entire country. With 21 golf courses spread across the valley and surrounding areas, the Reno-Tahoe region offers a range of country club communities that rival anything you would find in Scottsdale or Palm Springs. We sat down with top Reno luxury real estate agent Soni Jackson of SoniJackson.com to get her insider breakdown of

If you are thinking about buying a short-term rental property in South Lake Tahoe, the rules have changed significantly in recent months. In this episode of the Reno-Tahoe Real Estate Insider, I sat down with Mark Salmon, a South Lake Tahoe real estate agent since 2005, to break down the new ordinance, what happened when the permit window opened, and what buyers should realistically expect right now. What Happened With Measure T and the New Ordinance The short-term rental con