Channing Boucher

I am pleased to announce two successful real estate closings this month in Crested Butte Colorado.

We are seeing a serious spike in home and condo buying in our local market. View this month’s edition of the Crested Butte Real Estate Advisor Issue #2. Scarcity is starting impact the market in key locations and average sold prices and average sold prices per square foot are rising in places like Crested Butte South, the Town of Crested Butte and Mt. Crested Butte.

My two recent sales are reflective of this trend. Additionally, pent up demand for our real estate is creating bidding war situations on certain property types.

I sold the 3 bedroom townhome pictured below last week. It is located at 311 Cement Creek Road in Crested Butte South. It was a bank owned REO that hit the market in January at $235,000. Multiple offers came in on the property during the first week on the market creating a situation where the seller received a higher than asking price for the home: It sold for $245,000.

SOLD: 311 Cement Creek Road

The second property I sold was my listing at 107 Big Sky Drive, located in the Pitchfork community in Mt. Crested Butte. This 3 bedroom townhome sold for $320,000. The property is 1360 sft and featured a double, heated garage.

SOLD: 107 Big Sky Drive

For a complete overview of the current real estate market in Crested Butte, please contact me anytime. Thanks for visiting today!

Channing Boucher
Benson Sotheby’s International Realty
Crested Butte CO USA
970-596-3228

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The local Crested Butte real estate market continues to improve. It is still early in the new year but the promise of a solid season of real estate investment is looking good. We are trending upwards in sales volume and average sold prices are actually rising in all areas around our valley. Our sales volume has already tripled versus last year during the same timeframe and the number of transactions is up 35%.

After surpassing $100 million in sales during 2011, most of it coming during the second half of the year, our market momentum continues with buyers stepping up significantly during this historically slow time for real estate sales.

During the first 7 weeks of the new year, 22 homes and condos have already sold ($14.5 million) and another 30 properties are under contract, representing over $14 million more in pending business. 7 of these transactions are valued over $1 million including the biggest sale we've seen in Crested Butte since 2005 - a $4 million Prospect ski home sale last month.

By comparison, last year at this time, our market had realized only $5.2 million in sales where the highest priced transaction was a $870,000 sale of a Mt. Crested Butte ski home.

Did You Know - Crested Butte Coal Mining History

Howard F. Smith, considered the founding father of Crested Butte, laid out the Town in 1878. While Smith was originally attracted to the area because of the extensive coal deposits, he first built a smelter and saw mill to service the hard rock mining camps located in the surrounding areas. This established Crested Butte as a major supply center prior to becoming a long-term coal producer. Coal mining emerged in earnest in Crested Butte during the 1880’s and 1890’s. The early coal miners, and the majority of Crested Butte residents preceding 1895, were Anglo-Saxon from Wales, Scotland, Germany, Ireland and Cornwall. These immigrants were followed by Greeks, Italians and Southern Europeans from Slavic countries.

In 1882, Crested Butte was home to 1000 people and had five hotels, a bank, several saloons and restaurants, three livery stables, sawmills, doctors, lawyers and the Union Congregational Church, which still stands today and is Crested Butte’s oldest building. Residents got their water from a two-million gallon reservoir located above the Town and in 1882 a telephone line connected Crested Butte and Gunnison.

Learn More: Visit Crested Butte's Heritage Museum

Upcoming Crested Butte Events in March

March 3 - Super Tour (Race & Rec Nordic Skiing Divisions), Crested Butte
March 4 - 7 Hours of the Banana benefit for Adaptive Sports Center, Crested Butte Mountain Resort
March 6 - John Oates Concert, Crested Butte Center for the Arts
March 8 - Full Moon Dinner at the Yurt, Crested Butte Nordic Center’s Magic Meadows Yurt
March 9-10 - Banff Mountain Film Festival, Crested Butte Center for the Arts
March 10 - Kids Rock Concert “Aloha in the Butte,” Presented by Trailhead Children’s Museum & Crested Butte Arts Festival, Elevation Hotel Ballroom
March 10 - Ski For Hope Nordic Challenge, East Side Nordic Trails, and Ski-a-thon
March 10 - Big Air on Elk Presented by Colorado FreeSkier

View Complete Calendar of Events

Thanks for reading today! We hope to see you in Crested Butte very soon!

Channing Boucher
Broker Associate
Benson Sotheby's International Realty

Contact Channing at 970-596-3228 or via his website.

Channing's Blog: The Crested Butte Real Estate Letter

Visit Channing's Featured Listings:
Homes and Condos for Sale | Land for Sale | Ranches for Sale | Commercial for Sale

View Channing Boucher's Newsletter Online


Real Estate Market Momentum for 2012

If the real estate market momentum we realized in 2011 is any indication of what we can expect this year, 2012 will be a good year for the Crested Butte real estate market.

Consider the following:

In 2011, the single, highest residential real estate sale we realized in Crested Butte was $3.125 million. This sale marked the first time since June 2007 the $3 million threshold was cracked for a home purchase at this end of the Upper East River Valley.

Also in 2011, we realized over 220 sales of homes and condos from Crested Butte South to Mt. Crested Butte. This is a jump from 143 total sales in 2010. We passed $105 million in total sales volume - the first time we've done that since 2008. And, we hit this mark with mostly all cash investments!

During 2011, the average days on market for sold homes and condos sold went down and average sold prices and average sold prices per square foot went up in all areas including Crested Butte South, Crested Butte and Mt. Crested Butte. See Advisor Issue #9 for details.

Already in 2012, we have realized a $4 million sale of a Sotheby's listed home in the Prospect ski-in ski-out subdivision. Its been over 6 years since somebody has purchased a house in our market for $4 million or more. (2005 sale: $4.3 million Skyland home). This is momentum!

Teocalli Park and CBMR's New Master Plan

The North Face lift with chairs? Two new ski lifts rising a total of 8000 feet to the top of something called Teocalli Park? CBMR has submitted a new master plan to the US Forest Service and its quite a departure from the Snodgrass Mountain expansion plan that was denied a few years back. Read the article at the Crested Butte News

Did You Know - "The Crested Buttes"

The East River Valley where Crested Butte is located was once used as a summer residence by Ute Native Americans. The Utes were quickly displaced when white explorers - beaver trappers and surveyors - first entered the valley. Captain John Gunnison, Gunnison County's namesake, was one of the first explorers to find the valley. Crested Butte got it's name from a geologist named Ferdinand Hayden who was on 1873 expedition surveying the Elk Mountains. From the top of what is now known as Teocalli Peak, Hayden referred to present day Crested Butte Mountain and Gothic Mountain as “the crested buttes.”

Crested Butte In The Media

The San Francisco Chronicle ran a recent article about our little town. ..."where every view seems to contain a snow-capped peak and ranchers still herd cattle on city streets - the American frontier is alive and well." View Article

2011-2012 Air Service to Gunnison and Crested Butte

View Flight Schedule (PDF)

Thanks for reading today! We hope to see you in Crested Butte very soon!

Channing Boucher
Broker Associate
Benson Sotheby's International Realty

Contact Channing at 970-596-3228 or via his website.
Channing's Blog: The Crested Butte Real Estate Letter

Visit Channing's Featured Listings:
Homes and Condos for Sale | Land for Sale | Ranches for Sale | Commercial for Sale

View This Month's Crested Butte Real Estate Adviser Issue #9 Online

Greetings from Crested Butte,

The narrative is changing in Crested Butte. This summer’s tourism season was a record breaker. Sales, lodging and restaurant tax collections were way up and the number of visitors to our valley spiked like the thermometer in Texas and Oklahoma. Custom homes starting popping up out of the ground and one of the first spec homes we’ve seen in years is under contract before it is finished. Sales of existing homes climbed in all categories and certain locations and now folks are talking in terms of a real economic rebound in Crested Butte.

For portions of the Crested Butte real estate market, it is still very much a buyer’s market. Right now, home sites at Buckhorn Ranch (five minute drive to town) are selling for less than $50,000 and you can still buy condos near the ski slopes for less than $100,000. Down in Crested Butte South, vacant land is available at historically low prices. Heavily discounted, bank owned homes are still hitting the market and in most cases they are selling off quickly to happy investors. Overall, inventories of vacant land and condos in our valley are still pretty deep. This fact alone is contributing to the low price opportunities.

But, if you were waiting for the bottom of the market to jump on that special Mt. Crested Butte ski home, the rustic 4 bedroom place in town or even that hot foreclosure deal in Crested Butte South, I believe that day has come and gone.

2011 will be remembered as the year luxury real estate investment came to life again in Crested Butte. Year to date, 31 properties listed between $750,000 and $4,500,000 have sold or are under contract. 19 of these properties have sold at or above $1,000,000. The average sold price for these 31 deals is above $1.6 million and the average sold price per foot is pushing $500/psf.

Year to date we’ve seen 162 residential sales and $77 million in real estate investment from Crested Butte South north to Mt. Crested Butte. Last year at this time we saw 143 residential sales amounting to $73 million in sales.

Consider the following previous year comparisons:

In 2010, 9 homes sold in Crested Butte South with an average sold price per foot of $133. Days on market for these homes: 300 days. This year, the number of Crested Butte South single family homes to sell has almost doubled – currently 17 homes – and the average sold price per foot is $156. Average days on market: 210 days.

In 2010, homes that sold in the town limits of Crested Butte fetched an average price of $801,000 and $411 per square foot. Days on market: 280 days. So far this year, homes in town are selling at an average price of $1.6 million and an average sold price per foot of $481. Days on market: 271 days.

Up in Mt. Crested Butte, only 12 homes sold in 2010. Average sales price was $640,000 and the average price per square foot was $216. This year, 19 homes have sold at an average price of $1,020,000 and an average price per square foot of $300.

The most interesting thing about all of this luxury real estate buying? Interest rates on home mortgages are still very low, yet, most of these luxury home deals are all cash transactions. Of the 162 sales year-to-date, almost 100 were cash transactions. My appraiser and mortgage broker friends are starving at a time while some of our little community’s all time biggest real estate transactions are occurring. In 2010, the majority of real estate purchases were done with conventional mortgages.

Spec Home Goes Under Contract Prior to Completion

It seems like it’s been years since we’ve seen a new spec home going up around the valley. Now, the community’s first under construction spec homes located in the Town of Crested Butte went under contract a few weeks ago. Asking price is just under $1.6 million.

New Master Plan for Snodgrass?
(borrowed from CBMR’s recent newsletter)

This past year, the Forest Service asked CBMR to revise its Master Plan for the resort, including plans on Snodgrass Mountain. At that time, the Forest Service made it very clear that they would consider lower impact skiing on Snodgrass (such as cat skiing). They also believe there to be more development opportunities on the main mountain (such as lift service and new trails within the Teo Bowl drainage). Using this specific information, CBMR has decided to revise their Master Plan to now include projects on both the main mountain and Snodgrass.

Ski Season Starts in Crested Butte November 23!
View CBMR's Website

2011-2012 Air Service to Gunnison and Crested Butte
View Flight Schedule (PDF)

Thanks for reading today! We hope to see you in Crested Butte very soon!

Channing Boucher
Broker Associate
Benson Sotheby's International Realty