Taos Real Estate

Really, this is good advice for any market, not just in Taos real estate shopping.  Realtor.com ran a short post about what to look for in shopping for condos.  The gist of the article is to carefully examine the condominium association documents, budgets and other financial information.  Just because a condo project looks healthy and well-occupied doesn't mean that this is the case.

With a single family home, you're pretty much in control of a lot of things that you can't control in a condo project.  With the pooled fees, maintenance and improvements are dependent on a properly structured budget, and condo owners that are paying their dues on time and in full.  Too many in arrears, and critical functions can be threatened...that is unless and until other owners have to increase their dues to make up the difference.

In today's more restrictive lending environment, lenders scrutinize condo projects carefully, as they lose some control as well.  They are denying loans if too many units are owned by one entity, or if more than 15% or so of owners are behind in their payments.  As a buyer broker, I don't just deliver condo docs and wait to see if you object to any of the items in them.  If you thoroughly understand them and don't need my help, great.  But, I want my clients to know that I'm ready to go over every document, and ferret out other information if necessary to make sure that the project's finances are in good order.

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Taos Rental Investment

As a vacation and resort destination, Taos has a rental property profile different from most other areas.  There are a number of factors influencing rentals:

• Much higher demand for vacation rental than long term
• Demand for long term rentals from locals is at the lower end of the rental price spectrum
• High home prices make positive cash flow difficult

There is a very competitive environment for vacation home rentals, so one shouldn't look for more than 80 - 100 nights a year unless the property is a really nice one and the marketing is good.

As far as long term leases, the demand is primarily for rents below $800/month.  The high prices for homes here make it very difficult to generate positive cash flow at those levels.  However, a nice niche is the guest house or small studio rental in the $600 range, while the main home is occupied or used by the owner.

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