In one of my earlier articles I discussed the potential impact of low oil prices on our real estate market here in Southwest Colorado. You can read that article here lower down on this site. Subsequent to those discussions I did an analysis of the residential closings for 2015 to look specifically at where the upper-end Buyers in Pagosa Springs, Colorado came from last year. I define upper-end as those sales that closed at $500,000 and above. Generally this will include custom single family homes within the Pagosa Lakes Area, including Timber Ridge, homes on small acreage within planned ranch developments such as Echo Canyon Ranch and Hidden Valley Ranch as well as large acreage ranch properties that included at least one residence.
For all of 2015 there were 48 upper-end closings, totaling $40,926,825. I could have chosen to only look at sales above $1,000,000 or started with a lower bracket, but historically, this is how I have defined the upper-end of the market in all of my past research. Within this group, 13 of the 48 purchases were made by Colorado residents totaling $8,676,600, representing 21% of the total, with an average purchase price of $667,431.
Buyers from California purchased only 3 upper-end residences for a total of $1,755,500, with an average purchase price of $585,167. Our friends to the south in New Mexico purchased a total of 3 homes for $1,805,000, an average of $601,667 per home. Buyers from California and New Mexico each accounted for 4% of the total sales volume of $40.9 million. During 2015 we did not have any upper-end Buyers from our other neighbor to the south, Arizona.
Let’s look at the volume of upper-end residential Buyers that came from Texas last year. There were 22, purchasing a total of $19,145,500 in residential properties, accounting for 47% of the total, with an average purchase price of $870,250. These are significant figures to consider, especially in light of the current downturn in the energy field.
Will Texans continue to visit Southwest Colorado and invest in our real estate? During the summer months, the daytime temperatures in August in Lubbock and Houston run from 91-95 degrees with humidity of 74%-90%. Unless there are some radical climate changes near term, the mountains of Southwest Colorado will remain an attractive place to visit and invest. If we continue to improve our area and remain friendly to the many folks that help to make paydays possible in a tourism-based economy, we should survive. If we forget how important our visitors from Texas are to our local economy, more could decide to bypass Pagosa Springs and drive an extra hour to Durango. Please, don’t forget to say “Welcome, glad you’re here” to those friends with the white and black license plates.
For assistance of any kind related to Colorado real estate, you can reach me at 970 264-7000 or email me at: MikeHeraty@frontier.net
