Despite National Decline, Housing Prices Up In Wyoming, Utah

By Headwaters News, 8-31-07

A new federal report says Utah and Wyoming are defying the national trend of declining home prices.

The Salt Lake Tribune reports today that, while housing-price appreciations hit the negative in markets such as Arizona and Nevada, both Utah and Wyoming reported double-digit increases for the first half of 2007.

Five of Utah’s cities made the list of cities in the nation with the fastest growing house-price appreciation, with Provo-Orem, Salt Lake City, and Ogden-Clearfield ranked second, third and fourth; and Colorado’s Grand Junction ranked fifth.  Wenatchee, Wash., was first in the nation.

But not all the news about Wyoming’s home price increases is rosy. 

According to a Casper Star-Tribune article today, the U.S. Forest Service said the skyrocketing price of housing in Jackson has the federal agency considering moving the Supervisor’s Office of the Bridger-Teton National Forest now located in Jackson to Alpine, where housing is more affordable for staffers.

As an alternative of moving its office, perhaps the Forest Service should consider supporting the proposal of a former Illinois man who wants to build a 500-home subdivision in Jackson.

The Jackson Hole News & Guide reported earlier this week that James Reinart, a 42-year-old developer is pitching a new kind of affordable housing that he calls “Homestead Ownership.” Reinart’s Teton Meadows Ranch would offer 125 affordable homes and 375 units that would be deed restricted, available only to persons who spend 1,500 hours a year in Teton County, who must agree to own only one home.