Ben Blonder's Blog

Fort Collins is a Hub for Foodies. We have so many amazing restaurants that I feel I should highlight a few of my favorites over this month. This time around, we are celebrating all of the great burger restaurants in town. One in particular sparked this post. Right downtown we have an AMAZING bur...

Born and raised in Chicago, Illinois I am a happy transplant to Fort Collins, Colorado. Today, on behalf of localism month I am going to introduce you to Fort Collins and, over the next 30 days, I am going to introduce you to Northern Colorado! First, lets start with the history of Fort Collins. ...

  What makes Colorado the place to move to lately? A combo of all that is good in life!   1. We have all four seasons, and enough time to enjoy each of them. Our winter may be long, but we get more sun than most any other state, so you can actually have fun in it! Our falls are BEAUTIFUL. Just go...

Facing high inventories, banks are looking to fix a growing problem of often vacant and deteriorating properties. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have been trying to liquidate their REO's. Fannie offered the HomePath incentives starting in 2010. HomePath had several key parts that made it feasible inc...

While New Home sales have been falling over the last few months, Fort Collins is fighting back. Year over year sales of new homes have increased 15.4% according to Prudential Rocky Mountain Realtors. In july 314 homes were sold with an average of $252,877, rebounding after a depressing 1st and 2n...

You know the music billboards top 100? Now IPhone apps have it too! These are the top 5 apps for managing documents, a key instrument to our on the go business! I recommend at least trying ALL of them! Wouldn't it be nice to NOT have to go back to the office to make copies and just take the file...

Architectural Review Board. Design Review Committee. Architectural Review Committee. Why Do They Exist?! One of these is bound to be the cause of a custom build homeowners stress at some point. So what is the point and how can you get YOUR design approved? Well, the whole point of the Review Boar...

There is an apartment shortage in Fort Collins, and the only solution is to build more. Luckily a few are already being built. Although different reports have different rates that I have seen lately, they range from 3% to 6.3%. Regardless, that is incredibly low and apartments/places to live are...

There are things every homeowner should do to LIVE in their home. But what about the landlords who don't live on the property? Here are 12 steps that every landlord should take BEFORE renting their space. 1. NEW LOCKS. Make sure you replace any and all locks! You DO NOT want to allow a previous t...

In most US cities buying is actually cheaper than renting. Between the beating home prices got and the demand for rentals, rent has risen and home prices have fallen making owning more feasible than renting. Buying a two bedroom home seems to be the way to go, especially according to Trulia, whic...