Thursday, January 28, 2010

Breckenridge’s Luxury Real Estate Sales Momentum Continues

The most expensive lot in Breckenridge, Colorado closed yesterday for $3,300,000.

On the heels of the record setting highest priced residence ever purchased in Breckenridge, Colorado for $8,285,000, another record in real estate has been broken. The highest priced residential vacant lot (single family home building site) sold yesterday for $3,300,000.

The sale is Lot 22 in the exclusive ski-in, ski-out neighborhood of Timber Trail. It's .55 acres and sits directly on Trygve’s Run, in close proximity to the new Peak 8 Village of Breckenridge Ski Resort. This is the premiere lot in Breckenridge with 360-degree views and unparalled ski area access. With the most recent sale, there are now only 2 lots currently available for purchase on Trygve’s Run.



Breckenridge Associates Real Estate continues to be in the forefront in record sales, with Dan Corwin acting as the Listing Broker for this sale. This transaction shows unique and desirable properties are still in demand and the current momentum continues to show signs of growth, especially in the luxury segment.

About Breckenridge Associates Real Estate
Breckenridge Associates Real Estate is a top-performing Summit County real estate brokerage with more than $111 million in sales volume transactions in 2009, focusing on the luxury real estate market. Breckenridge Associates Real Estate is a locally owned and operated real estate company comprised of 15 Broker/Partners, located on historic Main Street, Breckenridge, CO. www.breckenridgeassociates.com.

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Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Team Breck Creates "String Theory" for International Snow Sculpting Championships This Week in Breckenridge, Colorado

We are so proud of Team Breck and can't wait to see this year's String Theory snow sculpture come to life at the International Snow Sculpting Championships in Breckenridge, Colorado this week. Carving started last night and carries on through Friday night with judging taking place Saturday. Go get 'em Team Breck. Be sure to stop by and check out their work in action this week! Photo and description follow:

String Theory
“Each of our souls is like the vibrating string of the violin; resonating from the most profound sub-atomic level to the celestial reaches beyond. Music is the portal that allows us to connect our spirit to the sublime, and to grasp our place in it.”

String theory is a new branch of physics. It is a theoretical description that has shown great promise in uniting our understanding of what happens at the sub-atomic level with what we believe to be true in the larger world of matter and energy. To date, the laws that appear to govern these two domains are irreconcilable, and obviously this cannot be correct. Finding a bridge between these two clearly interconnected realities has been the Holy Grail of physics for decades.
String Theory describes all matter and energy as being composed of tiny, vibrating “strings”, each with its unique resonance, or harmonic.

Breckenridge Named #2 by Orbitz in Places to Ski

In a recent Orbitz blog, Breckenridge, Colorado was named the #2 out of 10 top ski destinations in the United States. The #1 ski destination was voted as Lake Tahoe. The ranking is based on Orbitz bookings from October 1-December 31, 2009. Colorado reigns as the most popular ski vacation state, not surprisingly given the amount of amazing ski resorts throughout our beautiful state. To read the full article, click here.

Thursday, January 21, 2010

The New York Times Names Breckenridge #23 in Top Places to Go in 2010

The New York Times named Breckenridge, Colorado a top place to visit in 2010. The article applauds our ski town for its "anything goes" reputation, the BreckConnect gondola that whisks guests right from town to/from the ski area, the recently opened Grand Lodge on Peak 7 and numerous great shops and restaurants. To check out why Breckenridge made the list and to view all 31 recommended locations, view the full article here.

Freeskier Magazine Votes Breckenridge Ski Resort #1 Pipe & Park for 2009/2010 Season

Citing Breckenridge Ski Resorts pipe and park as "unbeatable one-two punch in its endless park and mint halfpipe", Freeskier Magazine has voted Breckenridge #1 for the 2009/2010 winter ski season. Congratulations Breckenridge!

The Secret Stash - Celebrating Up Close & Personal with the Snow Artists

If you're in town for the 20th Annual Breckenridge International Snow Sculpting Competition later this month, you can't miss the very special opportunity to view the final touches being put onto the sculptures the night before judgin. The pre-judging celebration with the Breckenridge snow artists takes place on Friday, January 29, the evening prior to the International Snow Sculpture Championships judging. All of the sculptors are allowed to work through the night on this final eventing. Many are there all night long, and most are working to complete their sculptures. There's typically a strong following of dedicated spectators getting "up-close and personal" with the artists as they carefully and precisely execute their final touches on their masterpieces. It’s a great time to observe as the artists complete the final detail on their works of art as you'll be able to truly see the creations come to life. This is a welcome opportunity for the public to enjoy a casual “communal” campfire, to share in the camaraderie among the teams, and (or so we've heard) to offer a toast to their or somebody’s impending victory. Located onsite at the International Snow Sculpture Championship event, behind the Riverwalk Performing Arts Center.

Breckenridge's Signature Event Comes Alive for the 20th Year January 26, 2010

Celebrate 20 years of snow art in Breckenridge, January 26-February 7, 2010, as artists from around the world join together to carve and create masterpieces from 20-ton blocks of snow. Artists are allowed just 65 hours to transform each enormous blank canvas of snow into dimensional works of their own art – you won’t believe the masterpieces created from blocks of snow. This is a signature Breckenridge event – and not to miss!

In this commemorative celebration of the 20th year of the official international snow sculpting event in Breckenridge, Colorado, we’d like to pay tribute to the overall history of snow sculpting in our local mining town with a story told from one of the event founders and Breckenridge Associates Real Estate Broker/Partner, Rob Neyland, about how he and Team Breckenridge (made up of Neyland along with Ron Shelton & Tom Day – also Broker/Partners of our real estate office) started what is today a world-class event in Breckenridge, Colorado.

Creating A Snow Sculpting Event in Breckenridge, Colorado – as told by Roy Neyland:

My parents brought us to Breckenridge when I was a kid. My dad was determined that his family was going to know the world of snow skiing. As a teenager, I was smitten with this old-fashioned town with its own ski resort. The mountains were so beautiful, there was always stuff to do, and dude, it seemed like everyone was always on vacation! Count me in.

The skiing, and boarding brought all of us together here in the first place, but it is all of the other events and activities that keep us here in Breckenridge, and bring families back to visit. This colorful Colorado ski town is united by its passions, and celebrating these passions is where locals and visitors alike find a unique opportunity to really get involved. The zany, irreverent and home grown parades of Ullr Fest (Winter Carnival) and 4th of July are a perfect examples.

Ullr Parade floats are what got us started with snow sculpting here in Breckenridge some 30 years ago. Geez, that sounds old...make it 29 years ago--we flipped a coin. Heads we entered a float in the Ullr Parade, and tails we entered the snow sculpting contest, and built one in front of our real estate company. Tails it was, so we raided the kitchen and garage for tools, piled up a bunch of snow and set about making us a sculpture. We won! We won money! We were hooked. We planned and plotted next year's project (with secret designs of course), and came back and won. And the year after that I began to see pictures of snow sculptures in travel and skiing magazines, highlighting one of the unusual, engaging, non-skier aspects unique to Breckenridge. I wanted our little town to be known for this – the perfect blend of sport and artistic spirit, using Colorado's most precious natural resource, snow. One fateful January day in 1985 while we were working on our Ullr Fest sculpture, a guy came along and said, "Hey you guys are pretty good, have you ever thought about going to the Nationals?" There's Nationals? we gasped. "You bet. And Internationals, all over the world..." Our minds were blown. We knew then and there we had to land such an amazing event for Breckenridge.

And so began a four-year journey for Carvin' Marvin and the Snowflakes. To the U.S. Nationals and a host of international competitions – kicking a little butt, taking some names, building a roster and legitimacy for Breckenridge as a worthy place for these international sculptors to compete.

Hey…all we needed was just a few things: the ski area to make the perfect snow for us, the town's trucks and loaders and manpower to make all the uniform 20-ton snowblocks, free meals and condominiums for 80 people for a week in the middle of the ski season. Oh and by the way…could we have some ski passes and ski equipment for everyone? And one more thing…we needed an entire parking lot somewhere right in the middle of town that we can shut down for almost the whole month of January? It all sounded preposterous…But it would be glorious!

Where else could you pull off something like this? We set out to make it happen. We hounded any organization that would listen to us – the ski resort, Chamber of Commerce, the Board of Realtors, restaurants, hotels and lodging companies, ski shops, and of course the Town of Breckenridge. And wonderfully, magnificently in fact, everyone believed in the vision, and pitched in what they could. It was a smashing success, and now 20 years later, this annual transformation of a parking lot into a snow sculpture park has become one of the signature events on Colorado's winter calendar.


The Breckenridge International Snow Sculpure Championships draws artist from around the globe, and tens of thousands of spectators annually. For many, this gleaming display is a part of their first exposure to Breckenridge and Colorado. I can see it in their eyes, when we are out working on our sculptures. Their parents are bringing them to Breckenridge when they are kids, and they are never going to forget it. Yes, the sculptures melt and go away in a short time. But in that fragile, fleeting moment, hearts are touched for a lifetime.

And there you have it. Come and see the passion and beauty of this event in action January 26-February 7, 2010. Located in the large parking lot behind the Riverwalk Performing Arts Center. Check out the artists creating their works of snow art beginning Tuesday, January 26 and throughout that week. Judging takes place Saturday, January 30 and the sculptures will be on display through the following Sunday, February 7.

Make sure to stop by and check out Team Breck, made up of Rob Neyland, Ron Shelton and Tom Day as they join together to create this year’s sculpture titled, String Theory. To get a special sneak preview of our rendering for this year's sculpting contest, click here to view on our website . (Scroll to bottom of article to view "String Theory" rendering.)