Housing News Digest, November 17

Report: Greeley’s apartment vacancy rate posts largest decline in state
The vacancy rate for apartments in Greeley fell to the lowest level among metropolitan areas in the state during the three-month period ending Sept. 3

Apartment vacancies at 10-year low
The vacancy rate in Colorado apartments fell during the third quarter of 2011, dropping to the lowest rate recorded since 2001.

According to a report released Thursday by the Colorado Division of Housing, the combined vacancy rate for apartments in 22 markets across Colorado during the third quarter was 5.0 percent. The vacancy rate was 5.5 percent during the third quarter of last year, and the rate was 5.2 percent during the second quarter of this year.

Vacancies plummet, rents rise in Fort Collins/Loveland
Meanwhile, in a simple supply-and-demand market, the median rent has soared from $856.53 a year ago to $932.58, a $76 jump. Just over the last six months — from the first quarter to third quarter — the median rent has gone up $53.
It’s no surprise that the closer one gets to the Colo-rado State University campus the tighter the rental market becomes.


RedPeak gets an earful
With the passion and fervor found in a fundamentalist congregation, hundreds of people gathered Wednesday night - appropriately in a former church - and voiced their opposition to an apartment community planned in the heart of the trendy West Highland neighborhood.

But the only soul the people attending “listening session” in the Highland Event Center - formerly a Presbyterian church at West 29th Avenue and Julian Street - was that of the neighborhood, which many in the audience feared will be irreparably harmed if RedPeak Properties, a $400 million multifamily housing developer based in Denver - is allowed to build three, five-story buildings on three parcels just north of West 32nd Avenue and Lowell Boulevard.

Colorado foreclosures fall to 42-month low (VIDEO)

Colorado foreclosures fall to 42-month low. 9NEWS at 11 a.m. 11/16/11

Apartment vacancies fall
Colorado's apartment-vacancy rate has reached its lowest level since 2001, the Colorado Division of Real Estate reported today.

The statewide apartment-vacancy rate, not including Denver, averaged 5 percent in the third quarter, down from 5.5 percent a year earlier and from 5.2 percent in the second quarter.