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Ironically I am also in MA as the OP is. I still consider myself a pool newbie and am having a similar problem as of the last few weeks to month. This is only my second season with the pool and last year I never had to fill it once. Lately I've had to add water every 4 or so days since its getting below the skimmer. I believe the bucket test showed the pool was losing 1/3"-1/2" in 24 hours. I honestly could run another test to be more accurate. I put the 5 gallon bucket on my top step with only a few inches of water in it. Is this still valid or does it need to have more water in it?
The thing that concerns me is I have the cover on most of the time as we don't swim a ton. I am still losing this amount of water. I also did a test where I plugged all return jets and skimmers as well as shut all valves at the equipment. I still lost similar amount of water in 24 hours. I had a pool company come out and die test around obvious areas such as stairs, light, jets and they came up empty (I was not home to watch).
One thing I did find was the vinyl liner around the top stair wall is puffed up and seems to be deforming a bit on one of the stairs. The pool company claims there are no leaks there per die test and that this is normal if the water gets too low. I had assumed this meant water was getting behind it causing this problem and thus the leak must have been around the stairs. Pool company says nope. They left me with the advice to let the water drain until the leak is found. This seemed a bit excessive and expensive to me and might mean the end of using my pool for the season too.
Any other suggestions or insight? I appreciate any help.
Ironically I am also in MA as the OP is. I still consider myself a pool newbie and am having a similar problem as of the last few weeks to month. This is only my second season with the pool and last year I never had to fill it once. Lately I've had to add water every 4 or so days since its getting below the skimmer. I believe the bucket test showed the pool was losing 1/3"-1/2" in 24 hours. I honestly could run another test to be more accurate. I put the 5 gallon bucket on my top step with only a few inches of water in it. Is this still valid or does it need to have more water in it?
The thing that concerns me is I have the cover on most of the time as we don't swim a ton. I am still losing this amount of water. I also did a test where I plugged all return jets and skimmers as well as shut all valves at the equipment. I still lost similar amount of water in 24 hours. I had a pool company come out and die test around obvious areas such as stairs, light, jets and they came up empty (I was not home to watch).
One thing I did find was the vinyl liner around the top stair wall is puffed up and seems to be deforming a bit on one of the stairs. The pool company claims there are no leaks there per die test and that this is normal if the water gets too low. I had assumed this meant water was getting behind it causing this problem and thus the leak must have been around the stairs. Pool company says nope. They left me with the advice to let the water drain until the leak is found. This seemed a bit excessive and expensive to me and might mean the end of using my pool for the season too.
Any other suggestions or insight? I appreciate any help.
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You might end-up having to let the water level drop on its own for a while to see if/when it stops at a leaky area. Then you'll know for sure, especially if it does stop dropping at that top step. 
. Can any experts ballpark what replacing a liner in a 20x40' pool would be with deep end that slopes in the middle from about 3' to 10' deep?