Average home sale price hits all-time record

 

The median home sale price increased 16% year-over-year to $331,590 – an all-time high, per a report this week from Redfin. But that’s not stopping buyers from snatching up homes days after they’re listed.

During a four-week period ending March 21 and covering 400 metros, 58% of homes that went under contract had an accepted offer within the first two weeks on the market. And between March 14 and March 21, 61% of homes sold in that timeframe had been on the market two weeks or less, and 48% had sold in one week or less.

And offers are coming in well-above asking price, too. Nearly 40% of homes sold above their list price – another all-time high – and 15 percentage points higher year-over-year. The average sale-to-list price ratio, which measures how close homes are selling to their asking prices, increased to 100.2%.

This is concerning for experts, though, many of whom believe home prices will remain high even after mortgage rates, inventory, and building material costs recover to pre-pandemic levels. Rates are already above 3% – after falling into the 2% range during the majority of 2020 – but construction companies are still struggling to keep up with insane lumber prices, stifling new builds.

National Association of Home Builders Chairman Chuck Fowke recently noted that supply shortages and high demand have caused lumber prices to jump “about 200%” since April 2020, and the elevated price of lumber is adding approximately $24,000 to the price of a new home.

Vail Resorts slashes Epic Pass prices by 20%

 

Vail Resorts is turning the clock back on its Epic Pass prices to reward loyal customers following a trying year. On Wednesday morning, the resort operator announced that it is lowering the price of passes by 20% across the board.

The reset takes Epic Pass products back to prices last seen during the 2015-16 season, when Vail Resorts offered access to only 11 North American resorts. Now, it offers unlimited access to 34 North American resorts in addition to access to resorts across the globe.

In a news release, Vail Resorts said it is making the move to honor the loyalty of its passholders.

“The ski industry, our company and skiers and riders everywhere just navigated the most challenging season we have ever encountered,” CEO Rob Katz said in the release. “… As we double down on our pass strategy by dramatically reducing our pass prices, we are excited to make it easier for everyone to move into a pass, and we remain fully committed to ensuring continuous improvements in the guest experience.”

Katz went on to say that the pricing change also is an effort to grow the sport and make it more affordable.

“The new prices announced (Wednesday) not only provide value to existing skiers and riders, but we also believe they will contribute to the growth and vitality of our sport as we bring new people and higher engagement into the industry, which we think is imperative,” Katz said. “We also believe these lower prices will benefit our financial results based on new learnings from the past few years.”

The price reduction applies to the entire Epic Pass portfolio, which is on sale for the 2021-22 winter son at EpicPass.com.  The Epic Local Pass is now available for $583 (down from $729 last season) with no blackout dates, and the full Epic Pass is priced at $783 (down from $979 last season).

All 2021-22 pass products will come with Epic Coverage, at no additional cost, which provides full or partial refunds for personal events like job loss, injury or illness, as well as for certain resort closures, including closures due to COVID-19.

The move comes a little more than a year after COVID-19 cut the 2019-20 season short. Vail Resorts made the unprecedented decision to temporarily shut down all of its North American resorts March 14, 2020 — a decision that became permanent in the days that followed.

The company was then forced to reinvent the on-mountain experience at all of its resorts in just eight months to pull off a ski season in a pandemic, which included launching a much-scrutinized reservation system to limit crowds..

Frisco cancels 2021 Colorado BBQ Challenge

 

 #Colorado

Though case data and vaccination rates are improving, the town of Frisco has canceled the 2021 Colorado BBQ Challenge. Last year, the event was postponed and eventually canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic. This year’s event would have occurred June 17-19.

Current public health orders allow for outdoor events with a maximum of 175 participants, and the next phase of reopening moves the maximum attendance to 250 people. However, the event typically draws 12,000 to 14,000 attendees over two days.

“It is not responsible or in support of the health of our community and visitors to have an event which brings over 12,000 folks together on Main Street in three months,” Vanessa Agee, Frisco’s director of marketing and communications, said in a news release. “That said, stay tuned for future announcements about how we will be able to celebrate in Frisco this summer on a smaller scale.”

In an unusual move for the ski industry, Arapahoe Basin works to reduce skier numbers

 

 

Arapahoe Basin Ski Area’s ongoing effort to reduce the number of skiers on the mountain is bucking ski industry trends.

Summit County’s oldest ski area announced Friday that it would reduce the number of season passes it sells by 10% in an effort to preserve its “culture and vibe.”

While some Colorado ski areas have opted to partner with Alterra Mountain Co. or Vail Resorts and open their mountains to unlimited skiing and riding for Epic or Ikon passholders, A-Basin has taken steps back from the mega pass trend over the past two seasons.

Looking ahead to next season, the ski area will limit the number of lift tickets sold each day and cap the number of available season passes at 90% of what was sold this season. As part of the change, all tickets must be purchased online and in advance — no lift tickets will be sold on-site — and the ski area anticipates selling out of weekend lift tickets on a regular basis.

“We know pretty clearly when things start to get a little too busy, so we’re really focused on just trying to get just up to that threshold without getting too busy,” Henceroth said. “And we think we can really do that with … reduction in season pass numbers and limiting lift ticket sales on a daily basis.”

‘Lopsided Recovery’ Still Causing Housing Market Hurdles

The housing market largely outperformed the rest of the economy throughout 2020. But the housing market’s recovery still remains more “lopsided than ever as the gap between buyer demand and supply widens,” according to a newly released report from realtor.com® about the pandemic’s impact on the housing market over the past year.

New listings remain well-below the pre-COVID-19 baseline. However, the housing market overall in sales is performing above pre-pandemic levels, according to realtor.com®’s Housing Market Recovery Index.

“The housing market bounced back so much faster than other sectors of the economy that many have forgotten that housing activity slowed to a crawl during the early days of the pandemic,” says Danielle Hale, realtor.com®’s chief economist. “One year later, the demand for housing remains strong, while supply remains limited.”

Realtor.com® reports there are 50% fewer homes available for sale now than a year ago. The homes that are on the market are selling quickly. During the week ending March 6, homes sold, on average, six days faster than a year ago. “Buyers not only have fewer homes to choose from, they need to act fast to succeed,” realtor.com® notes in its report.

Forecast calls for 10-20 inches in Summit with much more east of the divide

 The Front Range is set to get hit by a massive upslope snowstorm that is likely to be measured in feet rather than inches. The forecast is less robust for Summit County but should still bring a nice refresh to ski resorts.

The storm is expected to arrive in earnest Friday evening with steady snowfall until the sun peeks though the clouds again on Monday.

The National Weather Service forecast office in Boulder has issued a winter storm watch from 5 p.m. Friday through 6 a.m. Monday, and is calling for 10-20 inches of snow west of the Continental Divide with winds gusting to 35 mph.

Ski area forecasting site OpenSnow also is calling for 10-20 inches of accumulation, saying the ski areas closest to the divide, including Arapahoe Basin Ski Area and Keystone Resort, are expected to do the best.

The Weather Service has warned that travel could be “impossible” during the storm, and the Colorado Department of Transportation has asked people to avoid traveling, particularly on the Interstate 70 mountain corridor.

Frisco plans to bring back pedestrian promenade this summer

Pedestrians

The Frisco Pedestrian Promenade will return to Main Street this summer, and with more than three months to plan, officials are hopeful they’ll be able to improve on the concept from last year.

The Frisco Town Council discussed the future of the promenade during a work session Tuesday, March 9, and while a consensus ultimately formed to bring the attraction back — along with some improvements — some members of the council pushed back against its return.

Earlier this month, Frisco issued a survey to businesses and residents hoping to get their opinions on the promenade’s potential return. Of the more than 300 respondents, more than 85% said they’d like to see it back this summer. About 55% of respondents were Frisco residents, about 16% were either business owners or managers, and about 14% identified as both a business owner and resident.

Respondents also provided insights into how they’d like to see the concept improve, with many voicing a desire to see more shaded areas, painted fencing and upgrades to the overall beautification of Main Street.

The council largely agreed that improvements could be made, in particular in terms of decoration. Council member Melissa Sherburne suggested bringing in the Make Frisco artist collective to help.

“I’d like to propose that we start that conversation early so we can get the ball rolling and really be thoughtful to bring the promenade to life a little bit more in terms of light and color and sort of accenting what we did last year,” Sherburne said.

Others emphasized that the promenade was a good opportunity for bringing the community together, and that it fit in well with the town’s strategic goals, even outside of motivations brought on by COVID-19.

“Last year, the ‘why’ was very much COVID related, but it doesn’t have to stay that way,” council member Jessie Burley said. “That’s how good projects evolve. And so I think even if the ‘why’ this summer isn’t necessarily COVID related, the ‘why’ is the community engagement and the energy we saw coming out of this project last year. … Seeing the activation of that last year, you know when we go back to our goals and our vision about trying to engage the community and bring them out, this is checking all of those boxes.”

Council member Dan Fallon came out against the promenade’s return, saying that he didn’t want to default to a pedestrian-only Main Street without first knowing what potential COVID-19 restrictions the town would be dealing with this summer and that the concept might fall flat if things begin to return to normal.

“I don’t think that the promenade, outside of those (COVID-19) constraints, floats enough boats to make it a net benefit to the community,” Fallon said. “… The promenade was really a salient social feature primarily, I think, because of the absence of anything else. … At the end of the day, before COVID, Main Street wasn’t broken in my world. The parklets were an interesting idea, and I think we can expand on that. But right now, I’m reticent to be giving up public space to private enterprise for their benefit without some other really demonstrated social benefit or community benefit. I’m not seeing it.”

HOW THE COVID VACCINE COULD HELP SPUR THE UPCOMING HOME SHOPPING SEASON

 

As it stands today, roughly 52% of homeowners say they would be comfortable moving to a new home under the current public health conditions, but the percentage of comfortable homeowners increases to 70% after widespread COVID-19 vaccine distribution, according to a recent Zillow survey of U.S. homeowners. Manny Garcia, Zillow population scientist, says that’s a difference equal to more than 14 million households feeling newly comfortable moving once the vaccine is administered to a larger portion of the population.

“We expect that the vaccine rollout will likely boost inventory, as sellers become increasingly willing to move despite COVID-19, resulting in greater numbers of new listings beginning this spring,” says Garcia in the Zillow report. “That injection of inventory could give buyers more options and breathing room in a competitive market. The vaccine, however, will also likely add to already-strong demand, given that most sellers will become buyers as they trade in for a home that better suits their new needs.”

Vail, Breckenridge Make List of 7 Top Hot Spots for Winter Vacations Homes

 

Vail, Breckenridge Make List of 7 Top Hot Spots for Winter Vacation Homes CAR | 03.02.2021

 Properties in ski towns may offer a big income stream for second-home buyers. 

After all, vacation homes have been trending during the pandemic, whether it’s a home in a cold- or a warm- weather locale. Second-home sales jumped 44% in 2020, according to data from the National Association of REALTORS®. 

Snowy hot spots are among those seeing surging demand. 

Searches for homes in ski towns surged 36% annually in the fourth quarter of 2020, according to research from realtor.com®. 

In fact, ski towns were rising higher in buyer interest than warmer areas of the country, realtor.com® noted.

Understanding Colorado’s ongoing drought

 

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The state’s snowpack sits at 84% as of March . Not too terrible, right? While this is an improvement from a month ago, Colorado has experienced nine straight months of above-average temperatures combined with 11 months of below-average precipitatio. And 100% of the state remains in drough as of March 4.

The prolonged drying and warming trend makes our soil really, really thirsty. As snows melts and rain begins to fall, the soil soaks up all the moisture, leaving less water to flow into local rivers. We see this happening in Colorado. In December, the Animas River near Durango saw the lowest stream flows in 109 year of record keeping. And forecasters don’t see relief on the horizon. The National Weather Service’s long-term climate forecas predict months of continued above-normal temperatures and below-normal precipitation.

All these trends have fire officials and emergency workers concerned for another frightening fire season. Although the winter of 2019-20 offered up a relatively average snowpac, the summer and fall of 2020 saw Colorado’s three largest wildfires burn more than a half-million acres. The entire state was blanketed with smoke from fires near and far, and the lack of summer rainfall created parched soils in advance of this season’s lackluster snowfall.

Already, state legislators are working on bills that address wildfire prevention, relief and suppression, including the purchase of a specialized firefighting helicopter. The idea is to get the bills passed before the start of wildfire season. Additional funding would support watershed protection, a critical need in the face of major wildfires. A fire-scarred landscape is more susceptible to erosion. And when snow melts or rain falls, eroding ash and sediment muck up water supplies.

In the first two years following the 2002 Hayman Fire, water providers spent $25 millio removing sediment and debris from Cheeseman Reservoir, a major source of drinking water for the Front Range. And by September of last year, Glenwood Springs had already identified more than $10 million in repair needed to improve water infrastructure as a result of the Grizzly Creek Fire.

As far as drought, Gov. Jared Polis in late November activated the municipal portion of the state’s emergency drought plan. That created a task force to help the state’s 700-plus water providers — who deliver clean water to homes, schools, hospitals, businesses and more — prepare for the anticipated drought challenges ahead. The task force already has conducted a survey to identify water provider needs, and they offer resources to help water providers plan for drought response.

While a few good storms won’t change the long-term outlook, I’m certainly hoping for powder this spring. In the meantime, we can all do our part to ready ourselves and our community for the changing environment. Maybe it’s preparing for increased wildfire risk through defensible space. Or perhaps this spring you’ll encourage your HOA to replace turf grass with low-water landscaping. Before the snow even begins to dwindle from the high peaks, let’s all take time to appreciate – and protect – our critical water resources.

Ask Eartha Steward is written by the staff at the High Country Conservation Center, a nonprofit organization dedicated to waste reduction and resource conservation. Submit questions to Eartha at info@highcountryconservation.org