ten years of tax relief

and it's aimed right at first-time buyers here in Anchorage.

The mayor's office just put forward two ideas to make it easier to buy your first place. The big one gives you a ten-year break on your property taxes if you buy a newly built home.

There's a catch. The home has to be at or below the city's average value, which sits right around 490,000 dollars. So this is built for starter homes, not the high end.

The idea is simple. If your tax bill is lower for ten years, more of your money goes toward the house itself, and that first step gets a little easier.

The second piece does the same thing for people who buy and live in a brand new condo inside a building that mixes shops and homes downtown. Builders who add four or more of those units get a break too.

Not everyone's sold on it. Local home builders point out that with today's labor and material costs, building a home under 490,000 is really tough to pull off.

This is all part of the city's push to add ten thousand homes over ten years. The Assembly takes it up on June 23rd, and it could pass as soon as July 7th.

For anyone here trying to buy that first place, this one's worth watching.