5 Great Neighborhoods in Aspen
Learn about the best neighborhoods to buy a home in pricey Aspen
By Rick Carroll, FrontDoor.com | Published: 12/12/2008
Aspen's charming West End neighborhood is filled with exquisite Victorian homes on beautifully manicured lawns.
There's just no getting around it: Aspen homes are expensive. The average home price is more than $4 million, and many of the trophy mansions and quaint residences are second homes that sit empty for much of the year.
For decades the town had been considered recession proof, but that changed in 2008. The woes of Wall Street and the national real estate crisis finally caught up with Aspen. Sales of single-family homes were down 60 percent for the first three quarters of 2008. Even so, it's not uncommon to see a home command an asking price north of $10 million. The big money is still out there, albeit more discriminating.
So how does the working-class make it here? It's not easy, that's for sure. Rental prices in Aspen rival those of Manhattan and San Francisco. Realizing the need to house the local workforce, the Aspen-Pitkin County Housing Office provides employee housing at cut-rate prices through a lottery system.
Winners of the lottery can purchase a home at a mere fraction of what it would sell on the free market. But if they sell the home, they cannot sell it on the free market, and its appreciated value is capped at 3 percent.
The price contrast between free-market homes and employee housing makes for an eclectic residential makeup comprised of ski bums and CEOs, pre-fab residences and 15,000-square-foot mansions.
1. The West End
No neighborhood in Aspen can match the beauty and charm of the West End. Exquisite Victorian homes rest on beautifully manicured lawns. At one time the neighborhood bustled with activity. Kids running around. Parents mowing lawns. Picnics and cocktail parties.
These days, however, the West End is mainly comprised of neighbors who only live there a few weeks a year. The West End is also the home of the Aspen Institute and the Aspen Music Festival & School -- two organizations vital to Aspen's cultural activity and summer economy. The Institute holds its world-renowned Ideas Fest every July, attracting a plethora of dignitaries and royalty, and the Music Festival hosts a nine-week classical festival each summer that attracts music lovers of all ages.
Also nestled among the West End are the Yellow Brick Schoolhouse, which has been converted to a daycare center, and the Red Brick Center for the Arts, occupied by local nonprofits like Aspen Public Radio and the Aspen Writers' Foundation.
The West End is a brisk walk away from Clark's Market as well as downtown, and bus routinely travel Main Street, which runs parallel with the neighborhood.
The neighbors: Jack Nicholson, Lance Armstrong and other celebrities, as well as a smattering of longtime locals and ski bums who bought property there in the 1960s and 1970s.
2. The East End
Unlike the neat and proper West End, Aspen's East End neighborhood is a smorgasbord of new monster homes, scattered housing projects for locals, and aging condos. The views of Aspen Mountain from the East End are impeccable and Snyder Park, in the heart of the neighborhood, is a veritable paradise for kids and picnickers, complete with waterfalls and a tiny jungle gym. Bus service is available, and it's a quick bicycle ride away from downtown.
The neighbors: Bank executives, artists, waiters, and second-home owners.