Aspen’s worker housing crisis as a credit signal
Aspen’s housing authority oversaw roughly 3,200 deed restricted units in Aspen and Pitkin County, the largest per capita workforce housing program in any North American resort. Yet local studies still found hundreds of additional affordable units were needed, with about 60% of the county’s workforce commuting from outside its borders.
Private employers stepped in. At one former campground near Aspen, resort operator Aspen Snowmass converted the site into a tiny home village housing roughly 115 to 120 workers each winter. “It is a scarce resource,” an executive said of housing, noting that more than 1,000 company beds still covered only about a quarter of the workforce.
For mortgage risk officers, those details matter as much as snow depth. If service workers are pushed into longer commutes or out of the valley entirely, visitor experience and brand value could erode, inviting stricter rules on short term rentals and transfer taxes and putting pressure on leveraged projects.
What ski town lenders should do next
Originators are urged to look beyond FICO scores and loan to value ratios. Darshit Chokshi, president and CEO of Aequitas Mortgage, described rising insurance and rebuild costs as quietly killing deals in high risk areas, arguing that models still “overinflated the cost estimates and thereby push[ed] the insurance premiums higher.”
Another reminded colleagues that buyers fixated on principal and interest often forgot that insurance and taxes can change, with double digit premium increases now common across multiple states.
