Politics or Religion

It's been said many times, two topics not to discuss with your clients is religion and politics. I'm going to stay out of religion but here I go in politics. The topic has to do with the issue of affordable housing in the city of Durango and La Plata County. I've lived here since the mid-70s so I've gotten to see a lot of changes and certainly a fair amount of growth. What has been happening in Durango over the years is that we keep building subdivisions and projects geared towards the higher end market and luxury budgets. I've had the opportunity to talk with many developers and watched the process through the newspaper and even on our community sponsored local television. My observation has been that the city and the county make it so difficult, so time consuming, and so expensive for development, that the developer is forced to build a project in the higher end market. He simply cannot get a normal return... and believe me, not every developer makes a profit... with all of the expensive hoops that they must jump through in order to get a lower priced project approved.

Let's put this burden of fault squarely where it belongs: government rules and regulations and fees make homes here cost considerably more than in other areas. Either the city and county don't get it, or they are purposely trying to not have affordable housing. They give lip service to the public about affordable housing, but their solution is to go to a developer and tell them that 16% of all the homes built in a project must meet the affordable or attainable housing level. Who in the world decided that it was a developer's problem that there is no affordable housing? Again I contend that the problem has been caused by the government, and they should fix it. If Durango becomes another Vail, or another Aspen where there is no worker housing we will have lost a great asset to this community. The clerks, the waiters, the teachers, the firemen and policemen all have the right to be able to live in this community and it is a community wide problem that needs to get solved, and not by just the real estate developer who didn't create the problem in the first place. If this is a concerted effort by our government officials to keep out the “working class”, then we should all be ashamed and we should throw them all out of office. There is an elitism that I'm beginning to sense that I have never sensed before in Durango. I am definitely seeing more of the attitude “Not in my backyard”, and “ I'm here now, so close the door behind me, don't let anybody else in.”

I'm certainly not proposing wild and crazy growth like I see up in Denver and Phoenix and other large cities. But I am very worried about losing our working-class in this town. If the city truly wants to step up to the plate and say let's do affordable housing is one they need to be willing to work on reducing fees and reducing the time it takes to go through the process. By reducing the fees the entire community is helping to support affordable housing, not just one developer. We have the money. Why in the world is the city Council buying up land for open space when over half our county is already national forest service or Bureau of Land Management lands? They have their priorities mixed up. They need to be stronger and take a stance and say “Affordable housing is a community problem and together we will get it fixed”.

Thank you for listening, but I really felt I needed to vent. Since this is politics, I need to insert the caveat that this is my own personal opinion and not necessarily that of the Wells Group Real Estate Brokerage.

Educational Conference

My father once told me “To find a business I like, spend time perfecting my craft, and I will never work another day in my life.” How true those words have been for me. In order to help me perfect my craft, this past week I was privileged to go to Costa Mesa, California and attend The Howard Brinton University class on leadership. This was an intense three-day leadership course taught by top-notch Realtors from around the country. These Realtors are the very best in their fields and exhibit true leadership skills in the operations of their teams.

At Team Lorenz we are very focused on bringing the best results for clients, and that starts at leadership and permeates throughout the entire team. At this conference I learned principles, strategies, systems, and techniques for superior service, effective time management, and the drive for results. Program content also emphasized the importance of being a model for change; to be on the cutting edge and to set the industry standard.

The program was presented as part of Howard Brinton's Star Power University, the real estate industry's only university-level series of intensive, comprehensive training programs. There are many events that address a broad spectrum of issues, but only Star Power offers a series of sharply focused, three-day programs for specific aspects of the business, from team building and systems implementation to buyer specialization and business operations. According to Brinton, participants in these events are part of an elite group of agents. “The quality of the learning experience and the depth of the practical knowledge and skills acquired by the participants is unparalleled."

Attendants have classes such as Howard Brinton classes is just a small part of my commitment to protect my craft and in that way to provide better service to the buying and selling public.

Durango's New City Council

Elections this past year for the new members to the Durango City Council brought in an entirely new wave of people. The council has certainly gone green with a quasi-stated no-growth or slow slow slow growth agenda. The concept that “I am here now, so close the door behind me” is certainly in effect. To emphasize that very thought, the city Council put a moratorium on riverfront development in downtown Durango as their first order of business. It will certainly be very interesting to see how this city counsel plays out. While nobody here is in favor of uncontrolled growth where a developer comes in and builds 300, 400, or 500 homes a year… we are not a big enough market for that type of thing to happen anyway. One of his council’s main objectives is to continue to acquire additional open space and Greenbelt area all around the city. From a practical perspective somebody needs to remind them that over one half of the entire county is already national forest or BLM lands which provide absolutely no tax base to the running of our governments or schools. I'm afraid we are going into an era of “esoteric” and away from the practical.

Clearly this is my opinion and it does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the Wells Group. I have a long history in Durango... four decades actually... so I've a pretty good sense of how things have changed and the rate at which they have changed. I see the agenda being shaped more by people moving here who have left an area where there was unbridled growth and are concerned that it will happen here. My concern is that we will create an elite community and become more like Vail or Aspen with skyrocketing prices that will price the regular person out of the market. City Council and city planners never take responsibility for the increased costs in housing that are really a direct result of their actions. This will be an interesting time until our next election.

The “action plan” for the smart buyer would be to buy anything and everything inside the city limits It is my opinion...and this is shared by others in my field…that Durango in-town prices will rise artificially because of a government imposed shortage of supply. As with all crystal ball predictions, only time will tell how accurate I am.

DURANGO RENTAL MARKET IS STRONG

With the recent upheaval in the mortgage market, we have found that more and more buyers are unable to qualify for loans. Many of these people are currently renters and would like to be buyers, but are being turned down by mortgage lenders. These people have good credit, they have decent income but they usually just don't have enough down payment to qualify for a loan. That has made the rental market in Durango very strong. I've seen rental properties go from $1,150 a month to $1,400 a month rental in just the last year. This certainly helps landlords and investors. At the same time, sellers who are unable to sell now have an alternative of keeping their property and getting very good rent for it.

I personally own rental properties and these have been very successful for me. I've also helped many clients learn the ins and outs of becoming a landlord. For the best return, I try to find homes in the low $300,000 or the high $200,000 price range. If you'd like more information on investing in single family residences, please send me an e-mail and I would be happy to mail you my 25 page white paper on Making Money Investing in Single Family Homes.