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As seniors try to downsize, Colorado’s housing market shuts them out
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The Colorado Sun, State

As seniors try to downsize, Colorado’s housing market shuts them out

By Brian Eason | Colorado Sun Most older residents want to age in place. But experts say Colorado’s housing stock wasn’t built with their needs in mind. Pat Malone moved to Arvada with her husband in the early 2010s for a more affordable retirement than they could have found in California. “Or so we thought,” she said wryly. The empty-nesters rented at first, then bought a single-family home. When the stairs became more daunting for her husband, it took them a long time to find what they needed. A single-floor condominium, with no stairs and no garden to maintain is a unicorn in Colorado. “We couldn’t find anything like that when we were (first) looking for a property,” said Malone, 76. “We really had no choice but to buy a house.” Seniors like Malone make up Colo...
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Priced out, packed in: Colorado renters squeezed by costs, policy gridlock and population growth
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Approved, Rocky Mountain Voice, State, Top Stories

Priced out, packed in: Colorado renters squeezed by costs, policy gridlock and population growth

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice Colorado’s affordable housing crunch – especially in the rental sector – has been building for years. Reports from the Common Sense Institute and Bell Policy Center trace the tipping point to around 2015, when demand consistently began outpacing supply. The last decade has seen rising home prices, stagnant wages and insufficient new construction which has made the situation worse due to recent immigration pressures and allegations of resource allocation issues. Origins and escalation of the crisis Bell Policy Center noted a statewide rental rate increase from 30.9% in 2009 to 34.8% by 2022, with urban counties like Denver reaching 50.1%.  In just a year, Colorado slipped further down the affordability scale, now rank...
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Walcher: We built it, and they still won’t come
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Approved, GregWalcher.com, Rocky Mountain Voice

Walcher: We built it, and they still won’t come

By Greg Walcher | Commentary, GregWalcher.com Building a new subdivision is complicated. Almost every city and county in America have master plans dictating “conforming uses” of land. Most specify lot and home sizes, rules for vehicle access, water supply, sewage disposal, flood control, affordable housing, and park space. Those are addressed in lengthy application processes and public hearings, all preceding building the infrastructure, and then the homes. The National Association of Home Builders says government regulations account for 24 percent of the final price of new homes. Sixty percent of that comes during planning and development, only 40 percent during actual construction. Those costs are many times higher when building businesses or industries. So, how much cheape...
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