Owners of Sunlight Mountain Resort are hoping a developer with vision will pay $50 million for the small ski area just outside of Glenwood Springs. It comes with 400 acres of land suitable for developing a 700-unit residential and retail village.
“A developer is the most apt buyer, one who would look at the ski area as an amenity and the 400-acre base area as a justification to buy the property,” said Jerry Jones, the Avon real estate broker listing the property.
Jones touted Sunlight’s location between the booming, high-end mountain communities of Vail and Aspen, its easy access from Eagle County Airport and the direct Amtrak service into Glenwood Springs.
“It definitely could be a destination ski area,” he said.
The ski area’s owners – Sunlight, Inc., a Colorado corporation consisting of 34 shareholders – decided the time was right to sell, said general manager Tom Jankovsky.
“The current owners just realized that they need to put a major capital investment into the area to get it into the 21st century,” he said.
Upward of $10 million is needed to update Sunlight’s current infrastructure, which includes three ski lifts and 67 trails on 470 acres of skiable terrain, said Jankovsky. The sale also includes permits for 2,081 total acres of U.S. Forest Service land.
Aspen Skiing Co., which owns four ski resorts nearby, said it has no interest in Sunlight.
“It’s not on our radar,” said senior vice president David Perry. “But you’d expect that whoever purchases it will have some knowledge about real-estate development and understands the value there. You’re not going to recoup that kind of investment from ski area operations alone.”
Vail Resorts Inc., which owns Vail, Beaver Creek, Keystone and Breckenridge, would most likely be prohibited from buying Sunlight due to anti-trust issues, said Jones. The company declined to comment.
Sunlight employs 190 people during the winter, and also offers a base lodge, a ski school, a snowmobile tour company and rental and retail outlets.
Opened in 1966, Sunlight saw 72,000 skier visits last season, down from a record 102,000 skier visits during the 1997-98 season. Half of Sunlight’s skiers come from Glenwood Springs.
It will be “business as usual” when Sunlight opens for the season on Dec. 1, said Jankovsky. Adult daily lift tickets cost $39; season passes cost $340.
Staff writer Julie Dunn can be reached at 303-820-1592 or at jdunn@denverpost.com.
