BUENA VISTA, Colo.—New housing built within walking distance of shops, restaurants and other services is expected to drive the housing market in interior West mountain communities, researchers say.
The Sonoran Institute, a nonprofit group dedicated to growth management in the West, studied high country housing trends from 2000 to 2010 in Colorado, Idaho and Montana. Researchers found that homebuyers were willing to pay an average of 18.5 percent more for a house in a “walkable” mountain neighborhood in the Rocky Mountains but that the supply of homes in or near downtown commercial areas is too small.
“There is growing demand for walkable neighborhoods, and it’s an untapped market opportunity,” Clark Anderson, director of the institute’s Western Colorado Program, told The Denver Post ( ).
The study found that younger residents are buying homes and are able to work remotely from towns formerly occupied by agricultural or service-sector workers. Meanwhile, older people are retiring in the mountains, household incomes are getting smaller and so are household sizes. Limited land supply in recreational mountain valleys also is generating interest in denser housing projects.
“These are trends that are happening in small communities, large communities, resorts, towns and cities across the Rocky Mountains,” Anderson said. “Consumer preferences and choices are creating a different-looking housing market from what we have known in the past.”
The study focused on Carbondale, Eagle and Buena Vista, Colo.; Bozeman, Mont.; and Teton Valley and Boise, Idaho. In all but Carbondale, buyers were willing to pay more for a home—as high as 31 percent in Buena Vista and 42.3 percent in Boise—that has nearby offices, shops and restaurants.
Researchers say conventional rural zoning often separates commercial and residential real estate into distinct areas—a model that is quickly changing as more municipalities look to denser mixed-use projects that allow more room for natural spaces like playgrounds, rivers and hiking trails.
Evidence supporting the demand for urban-style, compact development is obvious, said Chris Frampton, managing partner of East West Partners’ Riverfront Park along Denver’s South Platte River.
“This study is absolutely dead-on true,” he said. “Look at the mountains. The communities that are walkable do better: Aspen, Vail, Breckenridge, Steamboat. This is not a myth. It’s not a fad.”
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Information from: The Denver Post,
