Once again: The rural Colorado living reality check (Denver, Crestone: condo, how much)

[treedonkey]

I guess I'm just trying to figure out what towns there are west of the eastern slop but east of the state line, since it's all mountains out there.

[bluescreen73]

Originally Posted by treedonkey

I guess I'm just trying to figure out what towns there are west of the eastern slop but east of the state line, since it's all mountains out there.

Man I could spend a day putting them all here, but to summarize...some of the towns Jazzlover is referring to include (in no particular order):

Silverthorne, Vail, Leadville, Breckenridge, Frisco, Steamboat Springs, Durango, Pagosa Springs, Crested Butte, Telluride, Ouray, Montrose, Delta, Grand Junction, Parachute, De Beque, Rifle, Glenwood Springs, Craig, Alamosa, Aspen, Carbondale, Salida, Buena Vista, Gunnison, Paonia, Hotchkiss, Cedaredge, Granby, Winter Park, Eagle, Edwards, Kremmling, Hayden, Minturn, Monte Vista, Fairplay, Bailey, Woodland Park, Cripple Creek, Blackhawk, Central City, Idaho Springs, Cortez, Nucla, and Naturita...just to name a few ;-)

Good god I felt like Hank Snow there for a second.

[treedonkey]

I meant, which one of those are NOT 'moutnain' towns, not what are all the towns called, sorry. I know there are way too many to name

[Plain Jane 3953]

Well, that pretty much covers moving to any rural town I would think. I fail to see how Colorado would be any different than any place else. Try moving to say, NW Iowa, into one of their small towns. Think you would get a really good paying job?? No, of course not. I live in a little village in Wales. The only reason I can live in this rural area is because my employer expects me to travel, and when I am not on the road my employer expects me to work from home. There would be no way I could get the salary I now get from a local employer.

Rural areas don't pay as well as big cities. I thought everyone pretty much knew that.

[borborygmi]

Originally Posted by Plain Jane 3953

Well, that pretty much covers moving to any rural town I would think. I fail to see how Colorado would be any different than any place else. Try moving to say, NW Iowa, into one of their small towns. Think you would get a really good paying job?? No, of course not. I live in a little village in Wales. The only reason I can live in this rural area is because my employer expects me to travel, and when I am not on the road my employer expects me to work from home. There would be no way I could get the salary I now get from a local employer.

Rural areas don't pay as well as big cities. I thought everyone pretty much knew that.

How is rural Colorado different from other rural places? Put simply, the difference is in the cost of living. The point here is that because it's Colorado- i.e, there are big, beautiful mountains here- everything here from real estate to essential commodities is extremely pricey. Therefore the cost of living here isn't lower in scale like it is most other rural parts of the country. In NW Iowa, to use your example, as well as in most other rural areas of America, the lack of solid middle class-level paying jobs is offset somewhat by a substantially lower cost of living compared to a big city. You may make less, but your dollar will go farther than it will in a big city. That is not the case in rural Colorado. Read my post above- it's rural pay scale compounded with big-city living costs. That's the crux of the issue.

[bluescreen73]

Originally Posted by Plain Jane 3953

Well, that pretty much covers moving to any rural town I would think. I fail to see how Colorado would be any different than any place else. Try moving to say, NW Iowa, into one of their small towns. Think you would get a really good paying job?? No, of course not. I live in a little village in Wales. The only reason I can live in this rural area is because my employer expects me to travel, and when I am not on the road my employer expects me to work from home. There would be no way I could get the salary I now get from a local employer.

Rural areas don't pay as well as big cities. I thought everyone pretty much knew that.

Job-wise you're right, but the cost of living in someplace like Steamboat Springs or Vail is MUCH higher than Northwest Iowa because of all the big money development there. Both are rural but Northwest Iowa doesn't have a glut of multi-million dollar vacation homes.

People get this over-glamorized view of mountain living, that is jazzlover's point. Only the really affluent can afford the swanky amenities that resort town living has to offer. The average salary in Steamboat is only 20% higher than the average salary in Craig - 40 miles away, yet houses in Steamboat are 300% more expensive than they are in Craig ($119,000 to $360,000).

[jazzlover]

Originally Posted by Plain Jane 3953

Well, that pretty much covers moving to any rural town I would think. I fail to see how Colorado would be any different than any place else. Try moving to say, NW Iowa, into one of their small towns. Think you would get a really good paying job?? No, of course not. I live in a little village in Wales. The only reason I can live in this rural area is because my employer expects me to travel, and when I am not on the road my employer expects me to work from home. There would be no way I could get the salary I now get from a local employer.

Rural areas don't pay as well as big cities. I thought everyone pretty much knew that.

The issue is not that jobs in rural areas don't pay as well as big cities. In Colorado, they pretty much never have. What is the problem in Colorado's rural areas is that the living costs--especially for housing, food, and fuel are now much higher than local incomes can support. For much of Colorado's history, that was not true. Salaries and incomes were less than in Colorado's urban areas, but living costs--especially those housing costs--were much lower, too. The trustifarians, equity locusts, developers, and speculators wrecked that.

[ryanek9freak]

You know the saying Jazz, "Save an elk, shoot a land devolper"

[jazzlover]

Originally Posted by ryanek9freak

You know the saying Jazz, "Save an elk, shoot a land devoloper"

Actually saw that bumper sticker twice today.

[ryanek9freak]

My old man is a land developer, but to his credit, he's developing pretty much worthless land in my opinion.

He does so responsibly, and doesn't build extravagant McMansions. Just modest 3-5 bedroom stucco ranches and bi-levels.