Monday, August 21, 2006

Northwest Arizona To Be The New Las Vegas Suberbia?

With Las Vegas out of water and land land prices pushing housing past affordability, developers are already eyeing Northwest Arizona for new regional housing and entertainment recreation development according to this story:

Out here, there's no Strip, but you may eventually get twice the house at half the price. "Here we own all this property and we control it, there you have to fight for every inch," said Leonard Mardian. Mardian plans to build a hotel, a winery, stores, golf courses, even a college. He scored a major victory securing the limited water rights, beating out Rhodes' company which also wants to build in White Hills.

Right now, the stretch of highway from Hoover Dam to Kingman is lonely and empty. And it will probably stay that way to a large extent. Unlike Southern California where wages often justify people commuting 70-100 miles to work each way, the Las Vegas service economy and rising price of gas will make families think twice about moving that far out for affordable housing.

However ... this new development will be very good for the region. A large influx of well-off retirees are driving up the Las Vegas housing prices, because Las Vegas (to date) has been an island with little regional development. This will give new opportunity to retirees who have leisure time, don't face a daily commute, and would gladly trade the Las Vegas traffic and hustle for the slower pace of life.

Hopefully, this development will help be a safety valve allowing the regions unstoppable growth to have less of an impact on the area's quality of life.

Recent Las Vegas related blog posts by Ted Newkirk:

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