When Kelsie and Levi Rose first laid eyes on Belle Creek after touring new homes in Thornton, it looked to the couple a little like ‘Pleasantville.’ Now, after three years there, “We love it,” Kelsie said, holding new baby daughter Brecken. “It’s the perfect place to raise a family.” She pointed to Belle Creek’s own K-8 charter school, a few blocks from a grand opening by Oakwood Homes that could land your family in pleasant surroundings for $179,500.

Oakwood’s Dwayne Montoya (left) joins Belle Creek residents Levi and Kelsie Rose and daughter Brecken, close to Family Center, charter school and small town market.

“We watched it for a long time,” said Oakwood’s Sales Director Kristen White, looking out on the trail system that passes close to the ‘Family Center’ with gym and community events, and to Belle Creek’s own Haraf Foods community market. ‘New urban’ neighborhoods generally command higher prices; but when a builder pulled out last year, affordably-oriented Oakwood made a move. more »

Rachel and Jeff LePera will have been married exactly two years when they close on their 3,100-sq.-ft. home in Stapleton this week. They filled those months looking at 20 houses in Wash Park and other trendy areas, while Jeff’s Realtor-dad Rick LePera viewed another 80. But you can visit a grand opening of the model that, once they saw it, was love at first sight.
Rachel and Jeff LePera in Infinity Home Collection’s new Carmel model home at Balboa at Stapleton. The couple will close on their own version of the plan later this week.

“It was a no brainer,” said Rachel LePera, who stopped by the new ‘Carmel’ model in Balboa at Stapleton, that’s become Infinity Home Collection’s fastest selling home. During their home search, the couple made a can’t-do-without checklist: great kitchen, usable outdoor space, finished basement for entertaining, and room for her baby grand piano. She had something else that she shares with many other younger buyers gravitating toward new-urban neighborhoods: a taste for modern, contemporary styling with wide open living spaces. more »

“I love front porches,” says Lisa Coyne, who grew up in a hundred-year-old house in California, and now has a brand-new one with a big porch and other turn-of-the-century charms, beside Stapleton’s vast Central Park. She and husband Kevin are among 30% of Stapleton buyers who are making moves-up within Stapleton…and you’ll see why when you tour the ‘Oxford 5’ by Parkwood Homes, the model they picked.

For their move-up in Stapleton, Kevin and Lisa Coyne chose the same floor plan as the Oxford 5 model by Parkwood Homes, open today near Stapleton’s vast Central Park.

In a year when many builders are offering models that look like Swedish furniture stores indoors, Parkwood has gone the other way — straight back to the classic look of colonial towns with names like ‘York’ or ‘Middlesex.’ There’s nothing ‘minimalist’ about the Oxford 5; it’s flush with gables and spindle stairs and lush wainscoting to waist high. Company President Jack Fleury developed the style for Gaithersburg, Maryland; and then heard about Stapleton’s community design — oriented to recreate the appeal of an older, Eastern town. more »