Stately customs beside Stapleton's Central Park have mountain views...
"People always say, 'You're kidding!' when I tell them we're building million-dollar homes in Stapleton," says custom builder John Keith, one of six builders doing just that in the City of Denver's most popular new community.
Each one is so anxious to show you (particularly if you're somebody who's imagining popping the top on your old house) that they're throwing a tailgate party today in six soon-to-be-completed Stapleton homes, offering drawings in each house for gift certificates, to as much as $200.
Most people know Stapleton for prices in the $300s to $700s range...but the 7-square-mile community created from Denver's old airport is also a place where new homes go head-to-head with custom homes in Hilltop, Crestmoor, north Cherry Creek and other city neighborhoods. "And we're not sitting on inventory," says Jennifer Gore, who heads sales for Stapleton Urban Estate Homes. "Six out of the 12 homes we have under way now are under contract."
Believe it or not, included in Stapleton's four years of rapid sales have been 70 custom or semi-custom homes, centered around a million or higher. When builders began offering those during the 2002 Parade of Homes, they were priced from around $700,000...but not anymore.
Of the six big homes you'll walk today, the very least expensive is $1.3 million; and the lowest price that a builder would consider to create a similar design somewhere else in Stapleton is $995,000. The highest priced of the homes under way now--$1.7 million and $1.9 million--are both already sold.
Lisa Hall, Builder Program Manager for developer Forest City, says those sales speak to how much buyers get from high-end Stapleton, compared to what a popping-the-top will yield in those gentrified neighborhoods closer in--starting with more space for the money, 3,200 to 4,800 square feet, not counting basements and "carriage homes" that older homes often don't even have.
Then there are the views that these sites--some over 10,000 square feet--will all offer. Every one faces a park...and all of the ones you'll see today opening directly to 80-acre Central Park (a tad smaller than Wash Park). With the Sand Creek Regional Greenway Trail running past (a 14-mile expanse!) most of these homes view Mount Evans even when you're standing down on the walk.
"This is definitely urban, with diverse architecture," Gore told me as we lunched with builders at Casey's in Town Center. Of the ones you'll walk today there's a Tuscan, a colonial, some contemporaries, a French country...each a 5-minute bike ride from Casey's, Starbucks and other haunts...even closer to a new Town Center that Forest City will build near Havana Street.
And they all get high-tech energy savings that are well beyond what an average pop-top will get. To visit the tour/tailgate party, take Martin Luther King (the old airport entry) east from Quebec, one mile to Elmira Street, turn left a block to Dayton, then left. Or call Urban Estate Homes at 720-249-5106.
Mark Samuelson is president of Samuelson & Associates, a homebuilding/real estate communications firm. You can e-mail him at mark@samuelsonassoc.com.
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