Congratulations to Beverly Fulkerson of Osgood, Indiana, who was the winner of a Montana mountain retreat in this year’s HGTV Dream Home Giveaway. Here’s hoping she gets to keep the place.

Fulkerson has been entering the HGTV promotion every year since 1998. This year, she entered almost every day. Her perseverance paid off when one of her entries was chosen from 135 million others, winning her a 3,650-square-foot house on the edge of Glacier National Park with stunning views of the Rocky Mountains and Whitefish Lake. The three-bedroom, 3 1/2-bath house is near a private entrance to the Big Mountain ski slopes.

But if history holds, Fulkerson and her husband won’t be able to hold on to the house. It’s not unusual for winners of contests like this to be forced to sell the properties because they can’t afford the income taxes, property taxes and upkeep. Even people who win makeovers of their current homes often must sell.

According to HGTV, only one of the first 10 Dream House winners has been able to hang on to their winnings. And just six of the first 21 winners -- there have been 23 contests so far -- actually lived in their new digs for more than a year.

The longest “survivor,” the 1998 winner, kept her dream home for eight years before selling it. But after taking out a mortgage on the place to pay her taxes, according to Country Living magazine, she used it only as a vacation property. (Country Living is published by Hearst, which also publishes HGTV Magazine.)

When it became obvious that the people winning its sweepstakes were unable to keep their new digs, HGTV began offering winners a cash option. Most winners now either go that route or sell the houses -- often back to their builders, but rarely at full value.

What’s the rub? Taxes, mostly. Since the winnings are considered income, Uncle Sam wants his cut -- as do the states in which these properties are located, and any other local jurisdictions with taxing authority.

If you’re lucky enough to win a house or renovation, you’ll be responsible for federal income taxes on the value of the property or improvements, plus state income tax, depending on your state of residence. You’ll pay taxes at the marginal rate, because the value of the prize is on top of any income you’ve earned from employment and investments.

Another problem: Most prize houses are located in areas with high costs of living. Compound that even further because property taxes, homeowners’ insurance, utilities and maintenance costs are recurring charges.

According to a breakdown by TurboTax for technology website Vocativ, the winner of a house worth $1.751 million would owe the IRS $693,300 in federal income taxes. Then there are state income taxes, which range all over the ballpark, and property taxes, which also vary from place to place.

However, if you take the cash option, which in this case is “just” $1.262 million, the feds would ding you for slightly less than $500,000. You’d also owe state income taxes, but there wouldn’t be any property taxes. Nice little windfall.

Most people can’t take the hit if they opt to keep the property, so they take the money -- more than $750,000, in the above example -- and run. That’s what the winner of the 2012 Dream Home in Midway, Utah, did; the home was later listed for $1.49 million, according to a detailed blog post by Laura Tedesco.

The 2011 winners tried to use their new Vermont ski-in, ski-out lodge as a vacation home, Tedesco reports, but only managed to use it five times before deciding to sell. The place sold for $2.7 million -- far below the $3.8 million HGTV said it was worth.

The sales taxes on the 2009 house in Sonoma, California, were $500,000, and the annual property taxes were $25,000. So the winner sold the place three months after she won it, for $2.2 million, and donated the contents of the home -- valued at $187,000 -- to charity. The buyer of the house was its builder, who marked it up 10 percent and resold it.

The 2008 winner would have had to pay sales taxes of roughly $700,000, plus $20,000 more annually for property taxes, so she sold her new Florida Keys house for $1.65 million. Just a few years later, the house was sold again -- for roughly half that amount.

The 2005 winner, Don Cruz of Chicago, ended up declaring bankruptcy; he couldn’t afford to keep the $2.5 million Texas mansion he won, though he made a herculean effort. He listed the place for $5.5 million, but after it went into foreclosure, it sold for $1.43 million.

The moral of this story is clear: Unless winners of these sweepstakes sell their current places and move, they probably can’t afford to take the hit. On the other hand, selling the prize house -- or taking the cash instead of the house from the start -- can result in a nice profit.

A new mortgage product is about to hit the market that could make it easier for owners to repair or rebuild homes that have been damaged or destroyed in floods, tornadoes, hurricanes and other natural disasters.

Dubbed the CHOICERenovation loan, it also will allow buyers to purchase older houses that need some work and, therefore, may be more affordable than newer places.

Four out of every five of America’s 137 million single-family properties are at least 20 years old. But the average age of the country’s housing stock is 42, according to the Urban Institute. That means the typical American home was built in 1977.

Houses with some years on them often need upgrading -- a new kitchen with the latest appliances, perhaps, or a remodeled bathroom with new fixtures and plumbing. Maybe a new roof. That’s why older places tend to languish on the market. People prefer to move into houses that are ready for occupancy without having to do too much to them.

The new loan from Freddie Mac will allow adventuresome buyers to roll the costs of necessary improvements into the loan amount. Better yet, they won’t have to do the work until after they move in. And they can act as their own contractors, as long as they demonstrate that they have the ability.

Freddie Mac doesn’t originate mortgages directly. Rather, it keeps the funds flowing for mortgages by buying loans from some 2,000 lenders nationwide, which borrowers deal with directly. And whenever the secondary market company tells lender-clients it will purchase certain loans that meet its criteria, the product usually becomes available to consumers in short order.

Freddie Mac just rolled out the loan earlier this week, so it will be a few more weeks before it becomes available. But when it does, Danny Gardner, Freddie’s senior vice president for single-family affordable lending, expects it to be a big hit because it addresses so many needs. It’s a multifaceted tool for lenders to keep in their arsenal, he said.

Most importantly, perhaps, CHOICERenovation will make the aging housing stock more attractive to first-time buyers. “There’s a fair amount of housing with deferred maintenance,” Gardner said in an interview. Cash-strapped buyers “should be very willing to undertake those issues if they can get houses at an affordable price.”

Because it can be used as a no-cash-out refinancing tool, the loan also targets current owners who are looking to stay put but need to remodel, seniors who need to renovate so they can age in place, and families who need to redo their places to accommodate aging relatives.

Similar mortgages are available through the Federal Housing Administration, the government agency that insures mortgages on behalf of lenders, and through Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac’s chief rival in the after-market. Both Freddie and Fannie pool the loans they buy into securities and sell them to investors worldwide.

One advantage of this type of loan is that it allows borrowers to finance both the purchase price and the renovation costs all in one loan and with just one closing. When two separate loans are involved, there also are two closings, which can be expensive, depending on where the property is located.

According to the latest data from ClosingCorp, settlement fees range from nearly 5 percent in Pennsylvania to less than 1 percent in Nebraska. The fees are based on the sales price and tax rates imposed by local jurisdictions, and include property taxes, title insurance, appraisals, recording fees, land surveys and transfer taxes.

Affordability and a shrinking inventory of houses for sale are probably the two biggest hurdles today’s buyers must overcome. As a result, there has been a huge surge in the renovation sector. Rookies have been forced to choose between buying houses that need some rehabbing or remaining renters, and potential move-up or move-down buyers have decided to stay put and improve their places rather than settle for something that doesn’t meet their needs and desires.

Since the Great Recession ended in 2009, the renovation market has more than doubled. According to the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University, the home improvement and repairs sector is now a $400 billion industry.

But what really sets the Freddie Mac offering apart is that it allows people to repair homes damaged in a natural disaster -- or better yet, prepare them for future disasters. Borrowers can use the proceeds on such items as surge barriers, foundation retrofitting for earthquakes, or retaining walls.

If a property has already sustained damage, its owner can use the loan to rebuild it so that it complies with all current applicable state and local laws, including zoning requirements.

Thousands of homes are lost every year to disaster, thousands more are lost to obsolescence, and even more could be upgraded to better survive a disaster.

Eligible properties for the new loan include manufactured houses as well as site-built, single-family houses. However, Freddie won’t deal with lenders that cannot exhibit some expertise in rehab lending.

In most real estate transactions, the focus is on the purchaser and whether he or she can afford to buy the property. But there is another, equally important question: Can the seller afford to sell?

Many sellers become riveted on the gross selling price, and fail to consider how much money they need to net in order to move to their next residence. And that can be a serious mistake, especially if they haven’t built up much equity in their current homes.

The commission they are paying the listing agent is sometimes overlooked, as is the share of their buyer’s closing costs they’ll be expected to pay, what they owe on their current mortgage, and the costs of the actual move.

If the seller doesn’t take those and other costs into consideration, his or her agent should, says Margaret Rome, the broker-owner at HomeRome Realty in Baltimore. It’s part of the agent’s job.

“What the seller needs has no bearing on the price. It is the place to start the discussion,” Rome posted recently on real estate site ActiveRain. “It is a must to find out (the seller’s) expected dollar amount. If no one has explained the cost of selling, or they don’t understand the fees, even with a full-price offer, (the seller) may not be able to afford to sell.”

Her advice to colleagues: “Never price a home without knowing what is owed and what the owners need to move forward. Find out the bottom line, their in-their-pocket number.”

More than a handful of deals have fallen through because a seller didn’t do the math -- or an agent didn’t urge them to.

“It amazes me how many sellers are surprised by all the additional costs,” said Endre Barath of Berkshire Hathaway Home Services in Beverly Hills, California.

Carol Williams of Wenatchee, Washington, once inherited a listing in which she figured out that if the owners did move forward, “they would probably be left homeless.” The sellers’ credit was in bad shape and they had hardly any equity. Fortunately, at her suggestion, they spoke with a lender and discovered the harsh reality of their situation. “They took the home off the market and stayed put,” she said.

According to a recent analysis from Zillow and Thumbtack, a home improvement marketplace, the typical owner will shell out $20,851, mostly in taxes and commissions, to sell their place.

Here’s a brief rundown of some of the costs of selling:

-- Prep work. Window-washing, painting, landscaping, repairs, staging to make the house more presentable -- none of these will add much, if anything, to your home’s value, but they should help sell the place more quickly.

-- Payoff. If you have a mortgage, you’ll have to pay the balance at closing. But the equity you’ve built up in your home should ease the sting, especially if you’ve owned it for five years or more. Home equity loans and second mortgages also have to be paid off, and your lender may charge a fee to do so.

-- Commission. Typically 5% or 6% of the selling price, this amount will be split between your agent and the buyer’s. On a $300,000 selling price, a 5% commission comes out to $15,000. But commissions are totally negotiable.

-- Inspection. It’s smart to get an independent home inspection to find any major issues and get them fixed --before a potential buyer’s inspector finds them and uses them as bargaining tools. Figure on spending $500-$700.

-- Closing costs. Yes, sellers have closing costs. And depending on how strong or slow the market is, the buyers may demand that you also pay some, or all, of theirs. Under this broad heading, there are recording fees, title insurance, warranty, settlement fees, appraisal fees, lawyers’ charges and settlement agent’s fees, along with bills for property taxes, utilities and homeowner’s association dues for the months you lived in the house. Together, these could add up to as much as 10% of the selling price.

-- Repairs. There’s no way to estimate this in advance, but anything your buyer wants fixed means money out of your pocket. Big-ticket items like termite remediation or roof repairs are obviously expensive, but even minor fixes can add up.

-- Moving. You can save beaucoup bucks by “hiring” friends and family help you move (a few six-packs and a couple pizzas should do the trick). Ditto if you rent a van. If you employ professional movers, expect to pay a couple of thousand, easily -- more, if you’re moving across state lines.

-- Utilities. Many power and water companies require new customers to put up a deposit when they open accounts, especially if you are moving to another city or state. You’ll get it back when you move out. But for right now, it’s cash out of your pocket.

-- Travel. Cross this item out if you aren’t moving far. But if you are moving long-distance, figure on racking up some significant dollars for hotels and meals.