At the end of March, the head of Denver-based development firm Nichols Partnership picked up the Cherry Creek Dance property along Third Avenue — a 0.43-acre corner lot prime for future redevelopment.

“We’re looking at a couple options. One is condos, and one is office,” Nichols said.

His firm paid $7.8 million, according to public records, for the 2625 E. Third Ave. property, which sits at the corner with Clayton Street. But the seeds for the deal were planted about nine months ago, Nichols said, when he bought the loan against the property.

Nichols said he paid face value for the $5.5 million note, which was coming due at the end of last month. He indicated that the previous owners couldn’t pay off the note without selling.

“Since we held the note, we were probably the most logical person to sell to. … Everybody and their brother had been trying to buy it, and we felt like we needed a little more control of the situation,” he said.

The $5.5 million Nichols paid for the loan is included in the total $7.8 million sale price.

Cherry Creek Dance founder Stephanie Prosenjak signed the sale paperwork. Her LLC purchased the property in May 2009 for $5 million, records show. Prosenjak did not respond to requests for comment from BusinessDen. Roche Fore of Roche & Co. represented the seller.

Nichols is familiar with Cherry Creek. His firm is the original developer of Clayton Lane, the retail-and-residential project being redeveloped by Denver-based BMC Investments and partners.

He said he likes that the neighborhood — a hot spot for redevelopment in recent years — has limited sites and high barriers to entry.

“It’s the only market in Denver that works financially right now,” he said.

Nichols said he thinks the Cherry Creek Dance property, which has long been expected to sell — “it was out there for too long,” he said — would have fetched more a couple years ago. But he sees pricing in Cherry Creek returning to more rational levels.

“The pricing over the past couple of years was unrealistic,” he said. “And because they couldn’t repay the loan. That reduced the price.”

A competing broker acknowledged that Nichols’ loan buy gave him the advantage. Phil Ruschmeyer of Ruschmeyer Corp. said he represented a client who offered $7.5 million, but ultimately concluded that Nichols would just top any offer.

“He shows up in extremely unique positions,” Ruschmeyer said. “Remember when he owned the one floor of parking?”

That’s a reference to a deal four years ago, when Nichols turned a forgotten right of first refusal for a portion of the Clayton Lane parking garage into a one-year, 150% return.

Ruschmeyer called the Cherry Creek Dance property “one of the largest, best sites left in Cherry Creek.”

The existing dance building is 10,500 square feet, according to property records. The business continues to operate and will be able to stay until Nichols breaks ground on his new project.

That project will require rezoning, a process that Nichols expects to take a year or so.

“Our hope is that we end up with the four-story option that the other buildings on the north side of Third have,” he said.

Nichols’ condo portfolio includes Spire, the city’s largest condo building, downtown at 891 14th St. On the office side, the firm developed its headquarters building at 1644 Platte St., as well as the more recent One Platte building at 1701 Platte St., which JLL recently started marketing for sale.

The firm’s most recent projects have been a Moxy hotel in Boulder, which opened last year, and the conversion of the Art Institute of Colorado office building in Cap Hill into a microunit apartment project. That wrapped up in 2023.

Besides the project where Cherry Creek Dance sits, Nichols said he’s also in the early stages of pursuing a condo project along Ford Street in downtown Golden.

“Golden is the only other market in the metro area that is comparable to Cherry Creek,” he said.

Story via BusinessDen

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Under Johnston’s first-ever executive order, which was unveiled Monday afternoon, the new Denver Permitting Office will begin reviewing permit applications in mid-May with a promise to process applications in 180 days. If the one-stop shop fails to meet that threshold, developers may be able to recoup up to $10,000 in application fees.

In an interview with The Denver Post ahead of the announcement near Union Station, Johnston said that when he was campaigning for his position in 2023, he often heard complaints about the city’s permitting system, which for years has faced backlogs and delays in review cycles.

“People around the city said, ‘We love Denver and more and more, we don’t build here — or try to avoid building here — because it’s so difficult, so complicated and so slow that it raises costs,’ ” he said.

The new office, he hopes, will make Denver “the best place to do business as opposed to one of the most challenging.”

Johnston announced the changes at the Urban Egg, a new location for the breakfast and lunch eatery at 1550 Wewatta St. Randy Price, the owner of the restaurant, said it recently went through the city’s express permitting pilot program for the 16th Street Mall corridor to build its new location.

“This has been an unbelievable experience for transforming the process of permitting and getting us moving quickly,” Price said. “As an owner and a business founder, all you want to do is get in, get open, hire new staff members, contribute to (the) community and start producing tax revenue for the city.”

Currently, site development plans for large-scale housing and commercial projects pass through seven city departments and can take more than two years to process, according to a city news release summarizing the changes.

The new process will streamline permits from the Department of Community Planning and Development, the Department of Transportation and Infrastructure, Denver Parks and Recreation, the Fire Department, the Department of Housing Stability, the Department of Excise and Licenses, and Department of Public Health and Environment.

Construction permits are required for new buildings, buildouts and remodeling.

Applicants will also have a “project champion” at the city who helps them navigate the process, the release says.

The office, which will have an in-person counter open from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. on weekdays, will be committed to answering any questions on permitting within two days.

If the city fails to meet its accountability standard of 180 days, developers can bring their application to a review board made up of department directors for all the relevant agencies. If that board can’t make a final decision on the permit within 30 days, the city will refund some or all of the applicant’s permitting fees, Johnston said.

“I have no desire to pay anybody back money. So that’s a good incentive for us to get it right,” Johnston said.

Morgan Cullen, the director of government affairs for the Home Builders Association of Metro Denver, said its task force has met with city officials and suggested improvements on permit reviews for several years.

In a statement, he said the association “is looking forward to reviewing the steps proposed … to streamline the review and permitting process. Improving permitting timelines is an important priority for HBA members that are actively building in Denver. The permitting process is a significant factor in the cost of building a home, and any improvements to that process will help our members better provide attainable housing in Denver.”

Johnston said this is the first time the city has ever committed to a specific timeframe for processing permits. The planning department long has had target review times depending on the type of permit or plan, but at times has missed the mark significantly amid backlogs.

The most recent figures on Denver Development Services’ public dashboard show permit approval times have averaged 256 days for major commercial projects, which include large multifamily residential buildings. Application approvals have averaged 355 days — nearly a year — for major residential projects, including new houses.

The mayor’s office worked with developers and builders, many of whom have been frustrated with slow approvals, to develop the new approach.

Jill Jennings Golich, the deputy executive director of Community Planning and Development, will serve as the director of the office and will have two staffers reporting to her.

“I look forward to building off our success in 2024 to work collaboratively with all city partners involved in permitting and our customers,” Golich said in the press release.

Johnston’s office reduced some city permit processes by about a third between 2023 and 2024, according to the release.

Event permits will still be processed separately.

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About halfway through his search, he said, he thought he had landed a place near downtown. At the last minute, an out-of-state buyer came in with fistfuls of cash and dropped $50,000 above his offer. His dream home — so tantalizingly within reach — now belonged to someone else.

“I almost moved out of Littleton,” said the Greeley native, who went back to renting in the city.

Hanks, 32, and his wife did finally buy a house in Littleton a year ago, landing a mortgage — albeit one that’s “definitely a stretch” — to cover the $600,000 price tag of the modest 1,700-square-foot home near Sterne Park. But he knows of so many other young families in his generation who feel “fatalistic” about breaking into the metro Denver housing market.

Colorado’s housing challenge is clearly not a Littleton-only problem. But in recent months, the city of 45,000 has become a reluctant microcosm of the larger battle playing out, in which a shortage of 70,000 houses, apartments and condos in metro Denver has kept home prices high.

The situation has prompted state lawmakers in recent years to pass legislation aimed at boosting density in cities across the state. That, in turn, has led some municipalities to resist such efforts as an infringement of their local control over land-use decisions. Pressure has also come from below, as in Englewood — where an attempt to encourage more density in the city abutting Denver prompted recall elections in 2023.

In Littleton, things came to a boil in January. City leaders, after facing significant resistance, tabled a proposed zoning ordinance dubbed the Neighborhood Housing Opportunities initiative. It would have permitted denser types of housing throughout the city, like duplexes, triplexes and attached townhomes.

Many homeowners saw the measure as an assault on the character of their suburban haven, which is largely made up of tidy single-family homes tucked into leafy neighborhoods.

But the building of more detached homes likely won’t lead Colorado out of its housing woes, advocates of greater density argue. In metro Denver, the median sales price of a home last month was $599,000 — just 3.9% below the April 2022 price peak.

“They feel they’re never going to own,” Hanks said of friends struggling to afford a place of their own.

Shortly after the showdown at city hall, a newly constituted citizen advocacy group that preaches caution on densification sprung up, called Rooted in Littleton (formerly known as Save Old Littleton). The group commissioned a survey from Magellan Strategies, a polling form that last month asked nearly 1,200 residents questions about Littleton’s residential portfolio.

The survey, the results of which were released in late March, found a strong lean toward supporting less housing density in Littleton. One notable result from the survey was a strong preference (among more than 3 in 4 respondents) for a direct voter voice in any future major zoning decisions in the city, rather than leaving it up to the City Council.

That sentiment alone told Joe Whitney, a nearly 30-year resident of the city who helped start Rooted in Littleton, that his fellow denizens felt they weren’t being listened to enough.

“Blanket zoning and blanket density is not the answer,” said Whitney, 64. “It’s like setting a wildfire to do a controlled burn.”

Resistance to state laws

Littleton isn’t just seeing recalcitrance on changes to its land-use code from its residents. Like the rest of Colorado’s municipalities, it is also negotiating directives on housing policy coming down from the state — some of which have triggered a forceful local-control defense instinct.

Littleton’s council recently passed two resolutions staking out positions on housing bills moving through the state legislature this session. It urged a “no” vote on House Bill 1169, the so-called YIGBY — or “Yes in God’s Backyard” — bill that would generally allow religious groups and educational institutions to build housing on their properties, regardless of how the land is zoned.

The Colorado Municipal League has called the bill an “unconstitutional” assault on cities’ and towns’ home-rule authority — and a measure that rejects “sound long-range community planning.”

Conversely, the Littleton council urged a yes vote by the legislature on a construction-defects reform bill that lawmakers are pitching as a way to encourage more condominium construction in a state that has seen little of it in the last few decades.

On April 24, the city will host an open house to discuss how it should comply with upcoming state mandates on housing and related matters that passed in the 2024 session, affecting Front Range communities. Those include laws dealing with allowing accessory dwelling units — including garage and backyard units — as well as parking requirements in neighborhoods near transit stops and residential occupancy limits.

Final votes by the Littleton council on implementing those mandates are expected in June.

At the height of the debate over the city’s proposed zoning measure in January, Councilwoman Pam Grove — who’s co-hosting the upcoming open house — said that during her half-dozen years in office, “never has an issue hit such a hot button.”

“We’re getting pressure from the state, and we have citizens in our city that feel strongly one way or another,” she said. “We can only do so much to fix this.”

A housing study commissioned by Littleton in 2017 projected 15,000 more people would move to the city over the next two decades. That would translate into 6,500 more housing units needed in the city by the 2040s.

So far, Littleton hasn’t joined the growing list of cities that have pledged to push back on state housing laws they see as overreaching. Westminster, Arvada and Northglenn are three metro cities that have indicated they may not fully comply with the laws, Colorado Public Radio reported in February.

The resistance goes beyond metro Denver. Colorado Springs officials said recently that they would take a stand against the accessory dwelling unit mandate passed by state lawmakers last year. Last month, the Lafayette City Council mulled taking legal action against the state over House Bill 24-1313, a law that required cities to allow denser developments around transit stations.

The Colorado Municipal League has mounted challenges against a number of housing bills over the last few years. Kevin Bommer, the organization’s executive director, said some of his member cities haven’t always felt included in the process of crafting those laws.

“When you have a bunch of people sitting in the room thinking about what local communities should do — but when you don’t have feedback or input from local governments — the outcomes aren’t necessarily things local governments can live with,” he said.

And cities, Bommer said, don’t build — “cities plan.”

“That’s what Littleton is doing. That’s what Arvada is doing, and Westminster,” he said. “What they need is the state to be a partner, instead of telling them what to do.”

What do Littleton’s residents think?

At the same time, Littleton’s city officials are facing pushback from residents exercised about potential changes to their neighborhoods. The Magellan survey, which was sent to 1,197 registered voters by text March 6-11, showed a strong lean among respondents toward prohibiting — or tightly controlling — density in the city.

The survey, conducted by a well-regarded Colorado polling firm, had a margin of error of plus or minus 2.79 percentage points.

A majority of respondents felt that denser housing in Littleton would not lower home prices, would not alleviate traffic congestion, would not reduce wildfire risk and would not reduce homelessness. When asked if they supported or opposed policies that would increase the housing density of some city neighborhoods, 54% came out in opposition, versus 44% in favor.

But there was a notable difference between age groups. Among respondents 18 to 44, support for more density outpaced the opposition, 53% to 45%. In the 45 to 64 cohort, however, increased density in the city lost by a wider 61%-to-34% margin.

And renters, who tend to skew younger, urged more density in Littleton by a nearly 2-to-1 margin, according to the poll.

Councilman Stephen Barr said he’s not surprised by the numbers, especially when it comes to the age breakdown. Barr, 38, moved to Littleton in 2018 and rented before buying a unit in a quadplex three years ago — the very kind of “missing middle” housing that Littleton’s 2017 housing survey said was needed to absorb the city’s projected population increase.

Having lived in a 400-square-foot accessory dwelling unit over a detached garage in California before moving to Colorado, Barr was the only person on the council in favor of adopting the Neighborhood Housing Opportunities initiative. He called the measure a “reasonably equitable step in starting to tackle this question.”

“If you’ve had economic security for 30 or 40 years, then we’re coming from different places,” said Barr, who graduated college just as the economy was cratering in 2009 amid the Great Recession. “As a renter, as someone who has lived in an ADU, as someone who lives in a quadplex — it’s hard to hear that the ways in which I’ve lived are unwanted.”

Whitney, with the Rooted in Littleton group, conceded that the high barrier to entry for younger people looking for a starter home in the metro area is something to pay attention to.

“It’s a valid claim,” he said.

But when it comes to making sometimes-drastic changes to someone’s neighborhood, most people see the largest investment they will ever make — their home — as sacrosanct, he said. It becomes “such an emotionally charged issue for people” — and one that is much bigger than one city alone.

“It’s a nationwide problem we have in terms of affordability,” Whitney said. “I don’t think it’s Littleton’s job to solve it for America or for Colorado.”

“It was a good policy,” mayor says

Littleton Mayor Kyle Schlachter has reservations about how the Magellan survey was conducted and how the questions were worded. He took the survey and determined that the results should be “taken with a grain of salt.”

He feels there is more sympathy for the city’s efforts than the survey results revealed, he said.

“I think it was a good policy. It was a good ordinance,” Schlachter said of the Neighborhood Housing Opportunities initiative. “But there were threats of lawsuits, threats of referenda and threats of recalls.”

Approving it, he said, would have been “one step forward and two steps backward” in the effort to make Littleton more affordable. City officials need look no further than next door to Englewood, where two years ago a similar focus on density led to recall efforts and lots of consternation in the community.

Four of seven council positions were subject to a recall election in the fall of 2023, an effort that ultimately failed.

While Littleton has tabled its rezoning ordinance indefinitely, that doesn’t mean residents are a hard no for any type of effort to bolster density in the city. Where that type of housing is located seems to matter a great deal.

A question on the survey that asked respondents whether they supported increased housing density within two blocks of busy Santa Fe Drive, Broadway, Mineral Avenue or Littleton Boulevard lost 52% to 44%. But when that distance was reduced to one block, respondents came down 48% to 47% in favor of higher density — though that’s within the margin of error.

South Metro Housing Options, Littleton’s housing authority, has been busy building several projects geared toward offering more affordable options in recent years. In 2024, a project called Overlook at Powers Park opened with 51 income-qualified apartment homes for seniors 62 and older.

And this summer, groundbreaking is expected on the 50-unit Montview Flats project near downtown Littleton.

Another crack at a citywide zoning ordinance is not expected again this year, said Littleton deputy city manager Kathleen Osher.

Hanks, the 32-year-old new Littleton homeowner, said curtailing and limiting efforts to improve the chances of securing affordable housing in the city could mean it never happens.

“My fear is that the scope would be so narrow that it would be easy to shrink it to where it is ineffective,” he said. “At some point, you’re going to have to pass that torch.”

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According to the March monthly trends report from the Denver Metro Association of Realtors:

• The median home sale price in March was $599,000. That’s down 3.9% from its April 2022 peak, but it still shows a 6.92% annual appreciation over the past five years.
• New listings for the first quarter of this year (15,529) more than doubled compared to the first quarter of 2020 (6,666).
• Despite increased inventory, sales haven’t kept pace. The metro recorded 1,061 closed sales for the first quarter of 2025. That’s up 7% from 988 in 2024, up 22% from 870 in 2023, down 8% from 1,147 in 2022, and up 20% from 885 in 2021.

Pandemic shocked housing market

Amanda Snitker, chair of the DMAR Market Trends Committee, said the pandemic triggered a need for change for home buyers.

“Whether it was a need for home offices and a place to school children or a yard for the kids and dogs who could no longer access school and park playgrounds, a place with a home gym or a detached home without public access points and elevators – this sudden urge was almost primal, a need to access space that felt safe,” Snitker said.

Demand and low interest rates created a surge, leading to a peak median sale price of $616,500 in April 2022.

Now, the market is balancing. Snitker said buyers no longer feel the same urgency to buy, so sellers must create that urgency by presenting a beautiful home at an attractive price.

“The good news for buyers in this current market is that the pricing rebalance has allowed the drastic value jump to even out,” she said.

“Sellers are in a different position than in 2020-2022; buyers are pickier and looking for homes that have been well-maintained, require minimal updating and, of course, are priced competitively for the current market conditions.”

Keri Duffy, a member of the market trends committee and a Kentwood Real Estate agent, said that during peak pandemic buyer demand, when remote work eliminated commute concerns, buyers chose homes in the foothills and the countryside.

“Buyers overlooked poor locations and outdated homes just to get their foot in the door,” she said.

Now, buyers will wait for the right home and show little interest in homes that need updates or are overpriced.

“For sellers, strategic pricing is more critical than ever,” Duffy said. “Homes that are move-in ready and well-presented still command strong offers, while those needing work may linger.”

Spring market trends

Colleen Covell, a market trends committee member and Milehighmodern agent, said Denver’s busy selling season starts in March and winds down in late May.

In March, the $1 million-plus market experienced a significant increase in inventory. But buyers were cautious, which led to more sales at lower prices, Covell said.

“Does this mean we are in a full buyer’s market for the $1 million segment? It depends,” Covell said.

“The lower-priced detached homes in this segment are still very competitive, with only about three months of inventory. But sellers of higher-priced homes will face a challenging market.”

In the $2 million-plus market, detached homes have six months of inventory and attached homes nine months of inventory.

The news and editorial staffs of The Denver Post had no role in this post’s preparation.

Especially worrisome, the three Democrats said in their joint letter, was the reduced wildfire protection that could result from the closure of U.S. Forest Service and the National Park Service offices in Fort Collins, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife office in Grand Junction and a Bureau of Reclamation office in Durango.

“As federal agencies, states and local communities work to prepare for heightened wildfire and drought risk during the warmer summer months ahead, we are extremely concerned about the risk that the closure of the USFS or Department of Interior (DOI) facilities in Colorado could result in a decrease of our state’s wildfire preparedness, ability to respond to drought conditions, and react to other threats to public safety,” the three wrote acting GSA Administrator Stephen Ehikian on Monday.

Those four offices are among 19 lease terminations covering 350,000 square feet proposed by the Department of Government Efficiency in late February and early March.

The three highlighted the Supervisor’s Office for the Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forest in Fort Collins, which serves as a base for dispatch and incident command in those forests, two out of 12 federal forests located in the state.

The three wanted to know if and when the offices will be closed and what will happen to the employees working there — are their jobs being terminated or will they be moved to another facility?

The office closures also seem to conflict with a presidential order requiring all remote federal workers to return to the office, which would, on the surface, seem to require more space, not less.

Initially, the DOGE list cited termination via mass modification as the status of most of the leases. A few of them have since changed with a description of “soft” termination or “true” termination as in the case of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Office in Grand Junction.

The letter also expressed concerns that staffing cuts at the GSA, which serves as the federal government’s landlord and leasing manager, could mean that the proposed terminations were not done with the proper oversight and coordination with the agencies involved.

The three also requested to be notified in advance and briefed in person on any federal leased office closures or federal property sales within the state.

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Zillow research also indicates that listing your home on a Thursday can lead to a quicker sale and a higher price.

Homes listed on Thursdays tend to go pending faster than those listed on any other day, as buyers are eager to view new listings over the weekend.

In comparison, homes listed on Sundays generally stay on the market longer, with Saturday and Monday listings also taking more time to sell than those listed on Thursday.

However, a national analysis by Realtor.com shows that the ideal week to list a home is April 13 to 19.

Historically, homes sold during that week in April sell for prices 1.1% higher than the average for the entire year and typically 6.7% higher than prices at the beginning of the year.

If 2025 follows the seasonal patterns of previous years, the national median listing price could exceed the average week by $4,800 and be $27,000 higher than at the start of the year.

Buyers put down bigger downpayments

The median down payment in Denver was $84,427 in December, or 15% of the home’s purchase price, according to Redfin data.

That’s 13% higher than the previous year. Homebuyers are paying more upfront to reduce their monthly payments as mortgage rates remain near 7%.

Redfin reports that nationally, the median down payment increased to about 16% of the purchase price, up from 15% a year ago.

The average amount rose by around $4,000 to more than $63,000, due to escalating home prices.

Buyers who make a down payment of at least 20% can avoid the additional expense of private mortgage insurance.

More cash downpayments

About 27% of homebuyers make all-cash down payments in the Denver metro, Redfin reports.

A Redfin survey also reveals that younger buyers use cash gifts from family for their down payments.

The report shows 36% of potential millennial or Gen Z homebuyers receive cash gifts from family to use for their down payments. About 16% of millennials and Gen Zers plan to use an inheritance to help buy a home.

Pending sales canceled

One in seven or 14% of pending home sales were canceled nationally in January, Redfin reports.

In the Denver metro, 15% of pending sales were canceled in January. That’s up from 14% in January 2024.

The news and editorial staffs of The Denver Post had no role in this post’s preparation.

Flock Homes, which buys homes that are pooled in a REIT-styled fund, raised a $22 million round last month, according to SEC filings.

That brings the Andreessen Horowitz-backed firm to nearly $50 million raised since its founding in 2020, when it raised $1.7 million. Flock also raised $26 million in 2022.

Though founder Ari Rubin declined to comment on the specifics of this round, he said the company will start buying new types of real estate. The new office at 2930 Umatilla St. in LoHi is an extension of that growth.

Rubin signed a one-year lease for the space, with hopes to grow his 12-person team to over 20 in the coming months.

So far, Flock has amassed a nearly $200 million portfolio of 850 single-family homes, which make up its fund. Homeowners sell their homes to the company in exchange for shares.

Rubin said Flock will begin adding multifamily units this year.

“Our clients are the millions of Americans who have owned real estate for a long time, and they’re just like, ‘I need an exit strategy. I don’t wanna deal with real estate. I don’t wanna deal with the property manager,’” he said.

But the reason most sell to the company is to avoid triggering Uncle Sam. Flock’s process avoids depreciation or capital gains, Rubin said.

“If you just sell the thing outright, you’re gonna pay 20%-plus in capital gains tax,” he added. According to real estate website Orchard, Denver’s median sale price has gone from about $309,000 in April 2015 to nearly $561,000 in February 2025.

“Then you could lose up to 30% of that value to frictions and fees,” Rubin said. “And as a result of this, people don’t sell.”

Flock appraises its homes and then gives sellers shares of its total fund at that value, minus a processing fee Rubin said is comparable to paying a broker. Flock also charges an asset management fee.

Flock manages and collects rent on those properties, managing about half themselves and having property managers for the others. That money is paid out in quarterly dividends to its shareholders.

“Our main goal is not just to generate money. Our main goal is to solve a problem for these people. It’s capital preservation. It’s piece of mind. It’s tax deferral. It’s estate planning. It’s flexible liquidity,” Rubin said. “A lot of funds out there say they’re gonna double your money in two years. But our goal is … low-risk, peace of mind.”

By adding multifamily assets, Rubin is aiming to expose Flock fund shareholders to more asset-types and decrease risk.

“We want to provide people scale and diversification,” he said.

Out of his staff of about 30, a little less than half are in Flock’s Denver headquarters, which was previously in Cherry Creek. Rubin also said he has smaller teams in both San Francisco and New York City.

He said that the fund collects just over $1 million in monthly rent and that Flock posted roughly $10 million in revenue last year, mostly from on-boarding fees.

“When we’re growing, we’re doing a lot of revenue,” he added, saying the 2024 numbers were a 400% improvement on 2023’s.

Rubin, a Chicago native, dropped out of the graduate business school at Stanford to build the company. The 35-year-old Harvard grad previously worked as an investment manager at Denver-based Ibex Investors.

He has since moved to Palo Alto, California, but said he hopes to be back in Denver after his wife finishes a medical residency.

One day, he hopes Flock’s fund has nearly every type of real estate under its belt, including gas stations, hotels and car washes.

“There’s so much underutilized real estate out there, and people have spent their lives just stacking up these amazing assets and don’t know where to put them,” Rubin said. “The long-term vision is one day to have hundreds of thousands of homes and other assets.”

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Between March 2020 and April 2022, median home and condo prices in metro Denver raced 38.5% higher, an unprecedented surge, to a peak of $616,500, according to a new analysis by the Denver Metro Association of Realtors.

Low mortgage rates and remote work arrangements fueled demand and pushed the supply of available homes to historic lows. That triggered intense bidding wars and fueled even more demand.

A move in 30-year mortgage rates from around 3% in the early days of the pandemic to around 7% in late 2022 has acted as a strong headwind against additional appreciation and pinned the market down. The median sales price in March was $599,000 — 3.9% below the peak in April 2022.

What has changed is the available inventory and the pace of sales, which have provided buyers with more negotiating power.

There were 9,764 condos and single-family homes available for sale at the end of March, a 14.1% gain from February and a 67% increase from March 2024. In March 2021, there were 1,921 properties and by March 2022 there were only 1,221.

Essentially, buyers now have eight times as many options to choose from on the market compared to what was the case three years ago. But the volume of buying hasn’t accelerated, and again that is due to a lack of affordability.

Looking across the first quarter of 2020, there were 12,065 properties sold, while in the quarter that just ended there were 8,697 sold, a decrease of nearly 28%. But that tapering happened early in the pandemic recovery. Buyers closed on 4,889 properties in March 2021 and 3,202 in March 2022. Last month they closed on 3,515 properties, according to DMAR.

“Five years later, the Denver Metro is experiencing the ‘after’ — a market returning to balance, though shaped by high interest rates,” said Amanda Snitker, chairwoman of the DMAR Market Trends Committee, in comments accompanying the report. “This market stabilization has come with lower buyer demand, higher inventory levels and stagnating prices.”

The 12.8% pace of average annual gains seen in the first two years of the pandemic was not sustainable, and the 6.9% annual appreciation rate averaged over the past five years is more realistic. But even that slower pace has outstripped the wage increases that serve as a key support for home purchases. And they are above the premium over inflation that housing normally generates.

Temperatures are much cooler on the high plateau where metro Denver’s housing market finds itself. In March 2021, listings went under contract in 19 days on average. Near the market peak in 2022, the average was 15 days. Last month, listings required an average of 48 days to find a willing buyer.

What comes next is uncertain. The clouds of high interest rates could pull away, allowing affordability to improve and the markets to march higher. Or the light fog could turn into a bitter economic storm that forces the housing market lower.

After the initial waves of the pandemic passed and the economy reopened, job growth has been solid, providing key support to home-buying activity despite higher interest rates. But the pace of hiring has slowed significantly in the past year and Colorado is underperforming the country as a whole.

In February, Colorado added 500 jobs over the prior 12 months, or 10,500 if the striking King Soopers workers are added back in. Even at 10,500 jobs added, the annual gain was the weakest since early 2021.

Population growth, another key support of housing demand, also looks to be softening after a brief bump over the past two years due to a surge in international migration. Both consumer and business confidence are falling sharply.

Buyers have more selection than at any point since the pandemic hit, and sellers are more anxious to make a deal. The question is whether buyers will be in the mood to buy if the winds are blowing against them.

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Their plans included an accessory dwelling unit above the garage so Nicole’s parents could live with them as they aged.

“This is the first time we’ve ever done this,” Nicole Kirby said. “We were so excited.”

So in June 2023, the Kirbys enlisted Castle Rock-based Adamo Building Company — which does business as Adamo Homes — to make their dreams a reality. The couple put down a $50,000 deposit and another $7,500 to complete the architecture plans.

The house never got built. Adamo, through its owner Carl Dean Amann, stopped returning their messages. The Kirbys’ architect told them the company had gone out of business and absconded with their money, they said. Contractors who hadn’t been paid by Adamo placed a lien on their property.

“They just dropped off the face of the Earth,” Tyler Kirby said of Amann and his company.

The Kirbys are among dozens of people in Colorado who allege they’ve been scammed by Adamo Homes. The company has been sued nearly 40 times since last year, racking up allegations of theft and fraud from jilted banks, contractors and property owners.

The Douglas County Sheriff’s Office confirmed that Amann is one of the subjects of a criminal investigation looking into the bankruptcy of a construction company based in the county, though a spokesperson wouldn’t say which one.

Amann and other company representatives could not be reached for comment. The firm’s website is no longer active and phone numbers for the business have been turned off. The homebuilder’s listings on Google and Yelp say “permanently closed.”

The cascade of lawsuits began last May and continued through this month.

One Texas couple sued Adamo in July, alleging they paid the builders nearly $500,000 to construct a home in Parker. In September 2023, they broke ground on the residence, but the couple later learned Adamo had failed to pay its subcontractors and suppliers, the complaint alleges. Numerous mechanic’s liens were placed on the property.

The company submitted false and inaccurate invoices, the couple said in their lawsuit, and allegedly charged the family for materials the homeowners never ordered. In April, the company abandoned the project.

The home, as of the lawsuit’s filing, had not been completed.

Numerous subcontractors have also sued Adamo over nonpayment. Alpine Lumber Company alleges the company owes it more than $46,000 for labor, materials, equipment and goods. Peak View Roofing says the business owes it nearly $40,000.

A Castle Rock landlord sued Adamo over more than $30,000 in unpaid rent.

An archived version of Adamo’s website advertises the company’s homes as being “built true.”

“Adamo stands behind character, craftsmanship and positive relationships,” the business stated. “As builders, we built our company with you in mind.”

Meanwhile, families like the Kirbys wonder whether they’ll see any of their money returned.

A Douglas County judge in September awarded the couple more than $122,000 in damages, though they haven’t seen a dime yet.

Nicole’s parents, thinking they’d be moving to Denver to live in the house, sold their residence in Arizona. They’ve been living with Nicole’s brother as they wait for the house to be completed.

The Kirbys eventually found another homebuilder to begin the process again. They hope to move into their new house in Berekely in December, a full year later than expected.

“We were too trusting in this process,” Tyler Kirby said. “Unfortunately, that’s not how the world works.”

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Since forming their partnership in 2015, Tri Pointe and Berk have worked to bring his sophisticated design aesthetic to nearly 50 communities across the country.

Painted Prairie, a new neighborhood in Aurora near Denver International Airport, showcases this synergy with two model homes now open for tours, allowing potential homeowners to experience Berk’s unique blend of style and functionality. Berk attended a March 20 media event to promote the partnership at Painted Prairie.

The new home community offers houses with three or four bedrooms, two and a half to three and a half bathrooms, and a range from about 1,600 to 3,000 square feet. Each home features open-concept layouts with natural light, sleek kitchens with ample counter space, bedrooms with privacy and flexibility, and optional customizable basements.

“At Tri Pointe Homes, we are proud of the life-changing design options we deliver to customers across all price points and life stages,” said Kelly Taga, division president of Tri Pointe Homes Colorado.

“We are committed to helping our homebuyers achieve their dream lifestyles. Collaborations, such as this one with Bobby Berk, give customers innovative and unique options to accomplish this result.”

Berk was the design expert on Netflix’s Emmy-winning show Queer Eye. In 2020, Architectural Digest named him one of the most famous interior designers today.

Berk, who has been designing homes for Tri Pointe for a decade, created 10 design collections, including Tailored Industrial, Luxe Bohemian, Classic Mid-Century, and Zen Sanctuary.

To help you pinpoint your aesthetic, Berk created a style finder quiz. It asks questions about how and where you like to spend your time and what furniture you like.

I took the quiz and got Serene Scandinavian with a touch of Zen Sanctuary and Textural Neutral.

The quiz and Berk’s 10 collections are designed to help people without overwhelming them during the home-buying process. He works to give home buyers timeless choices to simplify the process and eliminate stress.

“I want to provide guidance without creating choice paralysis,” he said,

Berk shuns trends because he thinks they age quickly.

“You need to focus on design that makes you happy,” he said.

He recommends focusing on how you plan to use the space, and his top tip is to choose the color palette first.

When Tri Pointe approached Berk in 2015, he’d never designed a home before, but he jumped at the opportunity.

“Don’t say no just because you’ve never done it before,” he said. “Never pass up an opportunity. Say yes and figure it out.”

The news and editorial staffs of The Denver Post had no role in this post’s preparation.