How to Save a Ski Town • Hacker News Board

Re: How to Save a Ski Town

#61

Post by bamboozled » Mon, Nov 29, 2021, 2:27 AM UTC

dustintrex wrote: post #46

bamboozled wrote: post #30

Same thing is happening in Asia. I know a few local towns, one in particular where some foreign guy now has his Japanese real estate license and access to a bunch of foreign investors looking for places. It's becoming an unmitigated disaster. The population of the town is somewhat severely aged; However, rather than that being an opportunity for young people to get a start, this property snake steps in an steals ever…

I don't think your view is representative of "Asia", or even Japan. Housing in Japan is by world standards extremely affordable and generally depreciates in value instead of appreciating, making it a terrible investment. If your town is "somewhat severely aged", that means the youth have already made the call to head for the cities and it's lack of jobs, not lack of affordable property, that's driving that. There are…

In "most" of Japan, that might be the case, but the article is about Ski towns. There is plenty of young people who have tried to move to ski towns from large cities and have already been priced out.

I'm not talking about some random country side spots, I'm talking about mountain towns, inline with the article.

"There are a couple of foreign-investor hotspot blips like newly trendy ski town Niseko"

Do you have any idea how much money has gone into Niseko? It's not new and trendy, that's been going on for quite some time now and continues to do so. The people who have made their money screwing that place over are now looking for their next victims.

Re: How to Save a Ski Town

#62

Post by pcmoney » Mon, Nov 29, 2021, 2:32 AM UTC

rjsw wrote: post #60

Tempest1981 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Logistics. Crested Butte is 3 hours from the nearest larger town, Grand Junction. Assuming good weather. You need workers and materials to build new housing. There is already a shortage of workers. Builders in Grand Junction can make far more profit by building in Grand Junction, vs driving 6 hours each day to Crested Butte and back. Same with hauling materials.

In other ski towns you build during the off-seasons and the construction workers live in the apartments that would be otherwise empty.

Crested Butte is not just a ski town. Most ski towns in CO are not just ski towns. But CB is especially popular with mountain bikers and is busy almost year round.

Re: How to Save a Ski Town

#63

Post by bamboozled » Mon, Nov 29, 2021, 2:34 AM UTC

umeshunni wrote: post #48

verve_rat wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So make empty houses (and AirBnB's) illegal (aka super taxed out the wazzoo). The people that live in a place should be able to say what they do and do not want in their town.

The irony is that most of these towns depend entirely on tourists for theirs existence. Those tourist dollars depend on Airbnbs (no one is permitting new hotels in these towns).

I'd imagine these towns survived just fine without AirBnBs for the last hundreds of years?

Re: How to Save a Ski Town

#64

Post by pcmoney » Mon, Nov 29, 2021, 2:34 AM UTC

reducesuffering wrote: post #57

boringg wrote: post #50

One of the biggest problems that is hitting ski towns is the hyper cheap season passes that everyone buys. The model has created a huge surge of demand for people to go skiing in winter which has put pressure on the local ski towns (more short term rental demands, second home buyers) and the resources at ski mountains (aka the insane lines on a good ski day now). It's interesting because it has allowed a lot more peo…

Lift tickets are like 2x what they were 7 years ago. Prices are matching demand, I doubt it's vice versa. Personally, I think social media is the culprit for the increased demand. Previously people in most places barely knew skiing was an accessible thing to do. Now you have mimetic desire from their friends posting glamor shots at the resort for all to see.

Not lift tickets. Ski passes like IKON and Epic caused an explosion of short term rental behavior.

Re: How to Save a Ski Town

#65

Post by notatoad » Mon, Nov 29, 2021, 2:34 AM UTC

umeshunni wrote: post #48

verve_rat wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So make empty houses (and AirBnB's) illegal (aka super taxed out the wazzoo). The people that live in a place should be able to say what they do and do not want in their town.

The irony is that most of these towns depend entirely on tourists for theirs existence. Those tourist dollars depend on Airbnbs (no one is permitting new hotels in these towns).

the tourist dollars do not in any way depend on AirBnB's because most of these resorts were built before AirBnB and were planned, approved, and built with a plan based on hotel capacity. the number of hotel beds and the lift capacity the resorts are tied to each other. similarly, the number of bars and other tourist amenities also gets decided bases on hotel capacity, and while that may have changed since AirBnB started ruining everything, for the most part it's the same as the resorts - they built enough restaurants and bars to service the number of guests the resort was built for.

the AirBnB's are causing the resorts to run at over their designed capacity, making long lift lines for everybody, making the bars too crowded, and making the town's tourist experience worse in addition to making it worse for residents.

Re: How to Save a Ski Town

#66

Post by thinkingkong » Mon, Nov 29, 2021, 2:36 AM UTC

reducesuffering wrote: post #57

boringg wrote: post #50

One of the biggest problems that is hitting ski towns is the hyper cheap season passes that everyone buys. The model has created a huge surge of demand for people to go skiing in winter which has put pressure on the local ski towns (more short term rental demands, second home buyers) and the resources at ski mountains (aka the insane lines on a good ski day now). It's interesting because it has allowed a lot more peo…

Lift tickets are like 2x what they were 7 years ago. Prices are matching demand, I doubt it's vice versa. Personally, I think social media is the culprit for the increased demand. Previously people in most places barely knew skiing was an accessible thing to do. Now you have mimetic desire from their friends posting glamor shots at the resort for all to see.

The individual tickets are 2x as high, but thats an intentional strategy by Veil to make the seasons pass seem cheap in comparison.

Re: How to Save a Ski Town

#67

Post by SwagGrocery » Mon, Nov 29, 2021, 2:39 AM UTC

reducesuffering wrote: post #57

boringg wrote: post #50

One of the biggest problems that is hitting ski towns is the hyper cheap season passes that everyone buys. The model has created a huge surge of demand for people to go skiing in winter which has put pressure on the local ski towns (more short term rental demands, second home buyers) and the resources at ski mountains (aka the insane lines on a good ski day now). It's interesting because it has allowed a lot more peo…

Lift tickets are like 2x what they were 7 years ago. Prices are matching demand, I doubt it's vice versa. Personally, I think social media is the culprit for the increased demand. Previously people in most places barely knew skiing was an accessible thing to do. Now you have mimetic desire from their friends posting glamor shots at the resort for all to see.

The consolidation of ski resorts by just a few companies (e.g. Vail), and the creation of the Epic Pass has dramatically increased affordability and access. Just a few years ago a trip to Vail was a big deal; now it's an easy weekend trip for anyone with Southwest Rapid Rewards and an Epic Pass.

Re: How to Save a Ski Town

#68

Post by lostcolony » Mon, Nov 29, 2021, 2:39 AM UTC

xrd wrote: post #43

SwagGrocery wrote: post #39

There are a lot of comments about eliminating investment properties and providing subsidized housing. Why don't we let the market work itself out? Let's see how magical Crested Butte is in a few years with no intervention. I suspect you'll be able to get a nice ski-in/ski-out condo at a significant discount when there are no longer any businesses open in the town.

Won't Amazon and Uber Eats step in to fill that gap? I sadly worry that technology will fill in the holes. When reading the article I was thinking to myself: "what if people who lived there could pool their collective cooking skills and offer up meals to their neighbors (letting their neighbors skip cooking, a need previously filled by local restaurants)."

The people who live there are the ones who can afford to own a second home that sits vacant much of the year.

You really think people that well off are going to cook food to sell? -And- drive it (since who else is going to drive the Amazon or Uber Eats vehicles) until self-driving, on mountain roads, becomes a reality?

Re: How to Save a Ski Town

#69

Post by barry-cotter » Mon, Nov 29, 2021, 2:39 AM UTC

souplesse wrote: post #55

barry-cotter wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Man, those people are awful aren't they? Telling people about nice places and nice things. It's supposed to be for the special people, like us. Idiots, blabbing about our stuff, ruining it.

I think you missed the point. There’s nothing wrong with Outside sharing nice places with world, but it’s ironic that they would also publish an article decrying the very popularization that they themselves often cause.

> The newspapers reported on the problem: it was so hard to find affordable housing in town that there weren’t enough people left to work in town.

That's the problem. Lack of housing. Not popularisation. The article writer don't decry the popularisation in the article though geephroh does.

Re: How to Save a Ski Town

#70

Post by moistly » Mon, Nov 29, 2021, 2:41 AM UTC

xrd wrote: post #43

SwagGrocery wrote: post #39

There are a lot of comments about eliminating investment properties and providing subsidized housing. Why don't we let the market work itself out? Let's see how magical Crested Butte is in a few years with no intervention. I suspect you'll be able to get a nice ski-in/ski-out condo at a significant discount when there are no longer any businesses open in the town.

Won't Amazon and Uber Eats step in to fill that gap? I sadly worry that technology will fill in the holes. When reading the article I was thinking to myself: "what if people who lived there could pool their collective cooking skills and offer up meals to their neighbors (letting their neighbors skip cooking, a need previously filled by local restaurants)."

My neighbour is nicknamed “Scratch’n’sniff.” I do not wish to eat any of his cooking.