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Tag: Housing affordability

Greg Lopez Puts People Over Parties in Unaffiliated Bid for Colorado Governor
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KJCT-TV ABC 8, Approved, State

Greg Lopez Puts People Over Parties in Unaffiliated Bid for Colorado Governor

By Brianna Chappie | KJCT The unaffiliated-party nominee spoke with KKCO prior to his campaign stop in Clifton for Saturday evening. GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. (KJCT) - In KJCT’s continuing coverage of Colorado’s gubernatorial race, reporter Brianna Chappie spoke with unaffiliated-party nominee candidate, Greg Lopez, ahead of his campaign visit on Saturday. Lopez is an air force veteran, and seasoned politician— having served as mayor for the town of Parker, a Colorado Director for the Small Business Administration (SBA) and recently as a House Representative for Colorado’s 4th Congressional District. But now, instead of running as a Republican, Lopez is unaffiliated. “I didn’t leave the Republican party because all Republicans are bad or the Democrats are a...
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Colorado Governor Debate Draws Sharp Divide on Gun Rights, Housing Costs, and Peters Commutation
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Colorado Politics, Approved, State

Colorado Governor Debate Draws Sharp Divide on Gun Rights, Housing Costs, and Peters Commutation

By Deborah Grigsby | Colorado Politics Two of the candidates for Colorado governor squared off in a televised debate on Thursday night, when Attorney General Phil Weiser, the Democratic nominee, and former U.S. Rep. Greg Lopez, an unaffiliated candidate, delved into issues of affordability, data center regulation and gun laws. The debate’s tone was civil. The policy differences between the two were palpable. Both candidates called out Republican nominee Victor Marx, a ministry leader and first-time candidate who declined to participate in the debate On housing, Weiser argued that building more “starter” homes and lowering the barriers to buying them is the right approach. Along with bumping Colorado’s supply of owner-occupied housing by 40,000 by 2035, he proposed c...
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Aspen Realtor Running for Congress Campaigns on Housing Affordability While Selling Luxury Homes
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The Washington Free Beacon, Approved, State

Aspen Realtor Running for Congress Campaigns on Housing Affordability While Selling Luxury Homes

By Ethan Barton | Washington Free Beacon Dwayne Romero, whose own house is worth up to $25 million, has accused 'Wall Street behemoths' of driving up rent while holding positions with BlackRock, Blackstone, and Airbnb. The Democratic nominee for Colorado's Third Congressional District, Dwayne Romero, has made housing affordability a tent-pole issue for his campaign, accusing "Wall Street behemoths" of "buying up homes and driving up rents." Yet, for years, his real estate firm has made big money selling multimillion-dollar luxury homes in Aspen, where residential property is so expensive that even the city's doctors and lawyers can't afford to live. Romero also holds stakes in BlackRock, Blackstone, and Airbnb, his personal financial disclosure shows. Romero t...
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Why deportations are only part of the affordability answer
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TownHall.com, Approved, Commentary, National

Why deportations are only part of the affordability answer

By Dmitri Bolt | Commentary, Townhall AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent argued on Thursday that mass deportations are already improving Americans’ economic circumstances. He pointed to a tightening labor market, rising wages for working-class Americans following the departure of more than one million illegal immigrants from the workforce, and reduced pressure on rents as fewer illegal immigrants compete for jobs and housing. However, it is important to remember that these problems existed long before illegal immigration reached its current scale, and they will remain long after, if we do not strike at the root of the affordability issue. "Things are getting better. We're seeing construction jobs picking up. We're seeing manufactu...
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Did illegal immigration drive up housing prices? A cautious yes with caveats
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Colorado Accountability Project, Approved, Commentary, National

Did illegal immigration drive up housing prices? A cautious yes with caveats

By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project Does an influx of immigrants (illegal or otherwise) drive up house prices? The answer to that question, as with many things in life, is complicated. A guarded, and cautious “yes” with plenty of caveats would be how I’d characterize it; if you introduce millions of people into a place, how can their presence not up demand? This is all the more so for a commodity like housing which has much higher connections to regulation and government than, say, cellphones. Simply looking at the spike in immigration post-COVID ought to convince any reasonable person that demand for housing would increase. See screenshot 1 (from the first link below) for a time series graph. In order to look into this question myself, I di...
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New Study Finds Government Taxes and Fees Add Tens Of Thousands To Colorado Home Prices
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The Denver Gazette, Approved, Commentary, State

New Study Finds Government Taxes and Fees Add Tens Of Thousands To Colorado Home Prices

By Peter Lifari | Commentary, The Denver Gazette Colorado’s economic competitiveness is slipping, and housing affordability is one of the most important reasons why. Policymakers have more control over this than they might think.   A new report from the Common Sense Institute details tens of thousands of dollars in housing-construction costs created not by land or water scarcity, labor costs, materials costs, market conditions or interest rates — but by nothing more than policy.  Housing affordability is as much an economic development and competitiveness issue as it is a social one. That matters in a state tracking business establishment losses and domestic migration losses.  This is a relatively new development for Colorado. For years, the ...
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Colorado Homeownership Slips Further Out of Reach as Prices Outpace Incomes
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The Coloradoan, Approved, State

Colorado Homeownership Slips Further Out of Reach as Prices Outpace Incomes

By Nate Trela | The Coloradoan A new study on homeownership shows just how unaffordable buying a home is across the country, including two Colorado metro areas where homebuying is out of reach for most of their residents even if mortgage rates were set to 0%. The report using data .from Ziffy.ai, an AI-powered real estate investment platform, included the Boulder and Grand Junction areas among dozens of examples of markets where more than half of the homes are unaffordable for most households, even if mortgages did not require paying interest. The analysis defines affordability as when the total monthly housing costs — principal, interest, taxes and insurance — are no more than 30% of the median household income in a market. It based the mortgage calculations...
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Denver Mayor Mike Johnston Officially Launches 2027 Reelection Bid
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The Denver Gazette, Approved, Local

Denver Mayor Mike Johnston Officially Launches 2027 Reelection Bid

By Michael Braithwaite | The Denver Gazette Denver Mayor Mike Johnston officially filed his paperwork Monday to run again for Denver’s mayoral office next year. The filing comes weeks after Johnston confirmed to The Denver Gazette that he would seek reelection as he focuses the final year of his current term on utility costs, childcare and other affordability challenges. “I think the most important thing is to focus on the biggest cost drivers families in Denver are facing,” Johnston said. “And the biggest one, by far, is the cost of housing.” READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT THE DENVER GAZETTE
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A mass of contradictions: One writer’s read on Phil Weiser’s plan for Colorado
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Complete Colorado, Approved, Commentary, State

A mass of contradictions: One writer’s read on Phil Weiser’s plan for Colorado

By Ari Armstrong | Commentary, Complete Colorado “Democrats lay out plan to win supermajority in Colorado Legislature,” reads a recent headline from the left-leaning Colorado Newsline. So how might Governor Phil Weiser interact with the legislature, whether or not Democrats reach their goals for legislative seats? For that we can turn to his 109-page “blueprint” Unsurprisingly, Weiser wants to be all things to all people. He talks about freedom, prosperity, and a business-friendly environment out of one side of his mouth while promoting tax and spending hikes and tighter regulations out of the other. Housing affordability Unaffordable housing exacerbates various other problems, starting, of course, with homelessness. It makes child care less available and mor...
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Colorado teacher home loan program puts school fund money at risk in foreclosures
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Colorado Accountability Project, Approved, Commentary, State

Colorado teacher home loan program puts school fund money at risk in foreclosures

By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project I wrote earlier in the week about Impact Development and taxpayer-subsidized mortgages. That newsletter is linked first below if you’re interested.I have an update of sorts to share. It’s not so much the program I outlined earlier, more a related program run out of Colorado Housing and Finance Authority (CHFA).The program is called the Schools to Home Program. The CHFA website for this program is linked second below. I’ll run through the details and a quick example here, but as I do, I do not want you to lose track of something.Hidden in all of the graphics and words are the following: public money is given out on loan to the people who are in the program, and they get generous terms on their loans that others woul...
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