Is Fort Collins brown and out-dated? (Boulder, Longmont: custom home, neighborhoods, new construction)

[wblack86]

Okay...this might sound weird but I watched an episode of House Hunters on HGTV, and they went to Boulder and all the houses they showed were AWFUL. And they were in the 200,000-250,000 price range. They were all stuck in the 70's. Not only were the outsides completey out-dated and look as if they haven't experienced a serious upgrade in over a quarter-century, but the insides were just as bad! Do people have no taste/culture in Boulder?

Now I know Boulder isn't Fort Collins, but they're close geographically. I am just looking at maybe migrating to Fort Collins in about a year or two and was sincerely hoping that it had a lot more up-dated houses and more "life" to the neighborhoods and houses.

Oh, and BTW I'm from Atlanta.

Thanks.

- Will

[Neditate]

Originally Posted by wblack86

Okay...this might sound weird but I watched an episode of House Hunters on HGTV, and they went to Boulder and all the houses they showed were AWFUL. And they were in the 200,000-250,000 price range. They were all stuck in the 70's. Not only were the outsides completey out-dated and look as if they haven't experienced a serious upgrade in over a quarter-century, but the insides were just as bad! Do people have no taste/culture in Boulder?
Will

Hey, Will. I saw that show and I was like WTF?
It was not an accurate representation of Boulder because for one, there are very few homes in Boulder in that price range. If you found one, it would be in a not-so great location and outdated. Tiny little 900 sf homes go for a half million these days.
Only ONE of those homes was actually located in Boulder. The one on Moorhead is an area where a lot of students live. Therefore many homes are not "kept up". (That home backed up to US 36, a very busy highway).

The other 2 homes they showed were in outlying areas. One looked like a subdivision in Louisville. I couldn't determine where the other home was but it sure didn't look like it was "in" Boulder to me.

[Mike from back east]

Will: Hello, hope you find a great place.

Look up homes in both cities on realtor.com and see what the stuff really looks like. Both cities are fine. Boulder is considered pricier.

[tfox]

Brown? Yes -- definitely. This is the western U.S, after all -- we live in the high desert (semi-arid, actually, but coming from the east coast there's not much difference.)

As for the dated house you saw in Boulder -- Anything that was bought for 250k in Boulder is bound to be dated -- or worse. In fact, I'm surprised that there are any homes in Boulder for a price that low. Seriously. The thing about Boulder is that there's very little new construction there in the last 20 years -- and what little is there is expensive custom homes, due to to growth restrictions there. People who want cheaper, newer, bigger, etc will move to Louisville, Lafayette, or Longmont.

Fort Collins is not like that -- there's certainly big and new if that's what you're looking for. But 200-250k in Fort Collins is still about the middle of the price range there, last time I checked -- don't expect anything too grand in that price range -- I don't know what it's like in Atlanta, but that's what it's like here in Colorado.