Best CO Ski Town To Move Family To? (Denver, Edwards: for sale, rentals)

[carpediem71]

We are seriously considering moving our family of 5 to ski country. We have 3 kids- 6, 5, & 2. My wife and I are in our mid to late 30's and both lived in Squaw Valley from '93-'94. We had moved out there after college to stay for 1 year before we got "real jobs". The day I left CA my boss told me "You're a skier - you'll be back". Well it's taken us 15 years to make the decision to return to the West and really follow our dreams. We love to ski and bike and most all outdoor activities. We're heavily leaning towards CO - we've visited there numerous times and feel it is the best option for us, as all of our family is back East in MD, VA, & SC and we can fly direct from DIA to most places back East. The Broncos have been my favorite team since 1985 and my favorite concert ever was U2 at Red Rocks. Seems like we are being led to be out there!

I run a successful small business out of a home office so employment is not needed. We realize that ski towns are 'more expensive' than towns on the front range, that is understood.

The places I've skied are - Jackson Hole, Vail, Beaver Creek, Summit County, Steamboat, & Winter Park. Never been to Telluride, Crested Butte, or Aspen. Steamboat seems a little isolated.

Here is what we are looking for:

*Small town atmosphere - friendly neighbors -
*We'll be renting a house at least for the 1st Year till we get settled
*Safe, clean area, low crime rate
*Great school system, high test scores, less than 20 kids per teacher
*Recreational Sport Leagues for the kids - soccer, lacrosse, swimming.
*Great restaurants
*Spa nearby
*Good Golf Course nearby
*Fitness center nearby
*Close proximity to world class skiing - not necessarily "In" Vail, or "In" Breck but close enough nearby so that we'd feel like locals and we could ski every week - not have to worry about traffic to get to the hill.
*Walmart or Target within 30 mins. or so
*Great healthcare
*Christian Church in area

Any thoughts or ideas are greatly appreciated!

[dj32]

We just spent a great deal of time in the Vail Valley over Dec and Jan. The market there is still going strong, some areas having 35% appreciation from last year. While we love the Edwards, Eagle-Vail, Singletree area (popular with locals) I would recommend Eagle, specifically Eagle Ranch. Check it out. Great family community and relatively affordable for Vail VAlley.

[Katiana]

I wouldn't rule out Steamboat. It has most of what you're looking for. I have no idea about the quality of the school system, but it has a WalMart, City Market, other stores, churches, hot springs, etc.

[delta07]

I would look into Summit County. It has everything you are looking for, with many towns that are family oriented. You will have easy access to several ski areas (Breck, Keystone, A. Basin, Copper Mtn.) and still be close to shopping. You are only an hour or so away from Denver as well. The Vail area, IMO, tends to be much more expensive and pretentious (although you will experience this is most mountain resort towns anywhere). I would look into Silverthorne, Dillon, or Frisco for housing. All are relatively close to I-70 and seem family oriented.

[Fuzz]

While Summit County does have a lot of the amenities you're looking for, it doesn't really have a "small town" atmosphere, which is #1 on your list (although neighbors are friendly). For family-oriented neighborhoods in Summit County, look at Silverthorne (especially north of Target), Summit Cove (unincorporated Summit County), and Frisco.

[sunsprit]

Downvalley Vail would meet all of your requirements. Look into the communities along the I-70 corridor in the Minturn-Avon-Edwards-Wolcott stretch.

More immediately "in" Vail, look into East Vail ... which is more local family oriented than resort oriented central Vail. A fair number of full time locals live in this area with the condo housing targeted to locals, and some long term families in the houses. The area is East of the Golf course, and extends up to the far reaches of Main Gore.

Alternatively, check out the areas North of I70 by West Vail. Contrary to the misconceptions of many posters on this forum, there actually is a year-around population that lives in Vail, and it's a larger population base than some of the other regional ski area communities. They welcome other families into the community, and it's a pretty good group of folks. Compare the size of the local school districts in the communities you're considering and you'll see where the full time residents live ....

Condo's in these Vail areas will run from $400,000 on up, and single family houses are now running $1mil and up. Duplexes are common, and tend to run in the same price ranges as the single family houses. Multi-unit housing, such as four-plexes are starting in the mid $4-500,000 range.

Close by, you'll have Vail and Beaver Creek to ski at, and Copper Mountain is just over Vail Pass to the East. There's a number of golf courses in the Valley, so there's choices there. Team sports activities for the kids, too.

Major shopping box stores (Home Depot, WalMart), supermarkets, all within easy reach downvalley, and pricing pretty much comparable to the Front Range cities of Colorado. Even the supermarkets in West Vail are comparably priced. The days of being "ripped off" in the larger mountain communities are long long past with the development of a large enough local stable population base to support the stores.

If you'd like a recommendation to a knowledgeable realtor/property management company in the Vail area, PM me and I can give you the name of a very good property manager. They have a handle on the rentals/leases in the area through their offices, as well as properties for sale. They and their staff are all long term residents of the area, family folks, and can give you detailed information about the local full time community and activities, housing, etc.

[Fuzz]

To add a little bit more detail to the Summit County information...

Condos usually seem to start at about $120K per bedroom.
3-bedroom single-family homes start at around $450K-$500K (supply is pretty sparse at this range though, and from what I've heard, what comes on the market tends to go very quickly, like in the same day).

Silverthorne has the largest proportion of permanent residents (80%). The other towns in the county count about 25% as permanent residents.

There's a City Market, Bed Bath & Beyond, Sports Authority, and Borders in Dillon, a Target and OfficeMax in Silverthorne, and a Safeway and Walmart in Frisco. That's about it for big-box stores in the area (although there is renewed talk of a Home Depot coming to Silverthorne). Lots of smaller, local stores of all kinds in all the towns.

As expected, lots of outdoor amenities of all kinds available in all areas.

But as I mentioned, the strip malls in Dillon, Silverthorne, and parts of Frisco definitely do not create the stereotypical, charming Rocky Mountain ski town ambiance that one envisions. If that's very important, you'd be better off in places like Crested Butte, Steamboat, or T-Ride -- the downside is that those towns may not have as many amenities nearby.

[Katiana]

Steamboat has just about as much as Summit Co. It is more isolated, off I-70 as it is, but really just about everything is there, so that shouldn't matter so much. It's not as if you can't get to Denver if you need to.

[jazzlover]

You can query my posts elsewhere on this subject. I consider resort towns a lousy place to raise kids.

[sunsprit]

IMO, Steamboat has a lot more "community" than Summit County due to the ranching, agriculture, mining, power plants, and other long term business interests in the area. It's the "regional economic center" of activity. But not large enough economically to support "box" stores, or the sales volumes that enable the local stores to have comparable pricing to the Front Range of Colorado. It's an expensive place to live for routine expenses, and expensive for property.

Keep in mind that the Steamboat area typically gets a lot of snow and prolonged cold temperatures through a long winter. I've had several friends move to SE Wyoming to escape the long cold Steamboat winters ... and SE Wyoming is well known as having a windy and cold winter season.

Also, when you're living in Steamboat, you're "locked in" to the one ski area. I mention this because ... in comparison to Vail or Summit County ... there's no choices re skiing which may be highly variable due to local snow conditions/cover. Depending upon weather conditions/recent snowfall, you may have a good option available in those other areas, while ... in Steamboat ... if it's a stormy weekend and skiing is miserable, that's all you've got. Of the many times I've skied the 'boat ... I've had more adverse conditions than the clear days of fresh powder and fabulous glade skiing there.

Also, as one observes, it's somewhat isolated and remote to Steamboat. "Just off I-70" would be highly misleading ... it's 70 miles away from Wolcott off I-70, or further if you take the routes to US 40 (like through Kemmeling) ... and all routes have some pretty serious mountain passes to get over in the winter months, with some stretches of rural roads that aren't more than 2-lane county roads. Denver is 170 miles away, and it's not uncommon in the winter months to take 5 hours to make that trip due to slow speeds dictated by the adverse road conditions that are still considered "good" at the time . It's a solid 3 hour trip during the summer months ... you're not traveling on 75 mph Interstates for most of the way. In fact, most of the portion of I-70 you'd be traveling on is no higher than 65 mph.

We've still got friends in the Steamboat area on small ranches/farms, raising livestock. In April last year, we went to pick up some Alpacas about 12 miles out of town. With our 4x4 Dodge 2500 pick-up, the last 7 miles into their gorgeous little developed valley was almost impassable going up and down the steep and short hills. They finally had to "pack" out the boys the last two miles to a place where we could load up our two-horse trailer so we could get back out. They were unable to drive out to the loading point, snowed in for the last few days, not uncommon in their area. The roads out US 40 through to CO 14 were snowpacked, and on the other side of the pass ... CO 14 up past Walden, it was almost completely clear and dry roads to the Wyoming border.

Steamboat would be a better choice than T'ride ... which is very isolated and remote from the amenities you list .... but a far distant third choice to the Vail Valley or Summit county areas you're looking at.