Midterm voters to take on Colorado's soaring housing costs

DENVER (AP) — Bloated housing prices in the past few years have crept into every corner of Colorado. In Rocky Mountain resort towns, wealthy newcomers gobble up the dwindling housing supply. In Denver, tenants owe an estimated $32 million in back rent. And in mobile home parks, the state's last bastions of affordability, out-of-state investors are buying the land and hiking up lease prices.

Fed-up Coloradans have taken the crisis into their own hands and will vote Tuesday on a host of local and statewide ballot measures intended to rein in the soaring cost of housing.

The U.S. Census Bureau found that over half of all Colorado tenants are considered rent burdened, spending more than 30% of their income on rent in 2020. Colorado housing prices rank among the nation's highest when accounting for how much its residents earn. The Denver metropolitan area alone saw home prices shoot up by 35% over the past two years, which was a larger increase than those in New York City and San Francisco, according to data from the real estate company Redfin.

Tyler Randolph, an eighth grade teacher in Denver, said that if an affordable housing solution isn’t coming from those he elected, “it has to come from somewhere else.” He voted for Proposition 123, a statewide measure that would direct an estimated $300 million in state tax revenue to low-cost housing each year. It's the only statewide affordable housing measure in the country that will be decided in Tuesday's midterm election.

Voters in at least 13 Colorado communities or counties are considering measures that would increase taxes on short-term rentals such as those booked through Airbnb and Vrbo or redirect existing taxes on them to help toward housing costs, at least partly.

In Colorado's largest city, Denver, residents are considering levying a fee on most landlords that...