If you are a teacher, you might be able to purchase a home at a significant discount. That's because the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) offers the Good Neighbor Next Door program. The program is open to teachers, as well as to firefighters/emergency medical technicians and law enforcement officers, as a way to encourage them to buy property and live in the communities in which they work.
The Program
The Good Neighbor Next Door Program is open to pre-kindergarten to 12th-grade teachers. Teachers who participate are offered a 50 percent discount off the list price of a home.
The program comes with a requirement: Teachers participating in the HUD program must commit to live in the home for at least 36 months. And the home must serve as their primary residence during this time.
Available Homes
Teachers can only buy certain homes through the Good Neighbor Next Door Program. Properties must be within one of several HUD-designated revitalization areas. As the name suggests, these areas need a financial boost. The federal government created the Good Neighbor Next Door Program as a way to increase home ownership in these geographic areas.
You can find a list of revitalization areas near you by visiting HUD's online list, the link to which is included in the "References" section of this story. Properties in these areas are available through the Good Neighbor program for five days, before they are put up for sale to the general public.
Participating
To make an offer on a Good Neighbor program residence, you must first check the program listings for your state, which you can do through the HUD Good Neighbor link included in the "References" section of this story. The process for submitting a request for a specific property offered through the program varies by state. After finding your state on the HUD Good Neighbor program site, follow the instructions for expressing interest in a home.
If more than one person submits a request for the same property, HUD will select a winner through a lottery drawing.
