Tuesday was our Luxury Homes Professionals tour. Our company, RE/MAX Properties, is the largest real estate company in the Springs, and we are the leaders in most segments, luxury homes (those over $600,000) being among them. As a part of our Luxury Home Professional certification (which I have), we have special tours arranged every month that include some of our more interesting luxury homes. This time it included Pine Creek and Kings Deer subdivisions, both of which are of a particular interest to me. I was surprised, and even a little disappointed, in the Pine Creek offerings. For the money ($840k and $950k), I was not as "wowed" as I had hoped I would be, especially with all the homes in the this segment I have seen in the last 6 months. I guess the close proximity, views and golf course are getting a bigger premium than I remembered. The Kings Deer offerings ($820k and $700k) seemed a lot closer to what I had expected. The Kings Deer home at $820k in particular was a "grabber", with a nice 2.5 acre lot, great view, over 6,000 finished square feet, and a "livable regal" feeling to it.
See What I Mean

One of the many things that brought us to Colorado Springs from the Bay Area of California (San Jose) 16 years ago was the affordable housing. Luxury homes probably don't fall into that bracket, until you look at how much house and land you get for the money. There are only 702 homes here in the category of $600k +, which makes this segment approximately the top 10% of the available inventory. $820,000 is almost 4 times the median price here, but it is hardly even above the median for places like Marin County, San Jose, or even Washington DC, and certainly doesn't get you 2.5 acres and a really nicely appointed 6,000 sf home! Just for grins I did a little search on realtor.com for single family homes in San Jose under $600k. There were only 423, less than 20% of the entire inventory of single family homes! The first house on the list made me laugh, it was $495k for an 864 sf cottage, and that is not even one of the more expensive surrounding areas like Saratoga, Cupertino or Los Gatos! No diss to Silicon Valley intended, but really...


All of this is to say, I am thankful we live in such a great place, and that our kids (and now grandkids), as they are beginning to set out on their own, can afford to live here too.