Affordable Employee Housing

Real Estate Espresso

On today’s show we’re going to focus on smaller resort towns. People want to visit the idyllic resort towns of Banff, Aspen, Vail, Sun Valley. The problem is that the most profitable real estate to develop is for the owner occupant, and the vacationer. Why would you build affordable housing that gets you $1.50 per square foot in rent when you can build a hotel room, or timeshare that rents for $2.00-$3.00 per square foot. A myopic developer will choose the higher value real estate every time. But the problem is, people won’t come and occupy those pricey ski chalet’s if there’s nobody to serve dinner at the nearby local brewpub, or stock the shelves in the local grocery store. Many of the service jobs in these small but affluent towns are going unfilled.

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host: Victor Menasce

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