Big Changes Coming: 2026 Legislation & Mountain Communities Explained | Ep 8

What really happens at the Colorado Capitol, and how do legislative decisions impact homeowners, renters, Realtors, and Colorado mountain communities?

In this episode of Real Estate in the Rockies, Ashley Kappel and Jessica Chariton sit down with Brian Tanner, Vice President of Public Policy for the Colorado Association of Realtors, to pull back the curtain on Colorado's legislative process and explore the policies shaping housing across the state.

Brian oversees government affairs, lobbying efforts, political advocacy, ballot initiatives, and policy strategy for Colorado Realtors. Drawing on more than two decades of experience in public policy and political strategy, he helps translate real-world housing challenges into meaningful conversations with lawmakers.

Together, they discuss:

• Colorado's housing shortage
• property rights
• housing affordability
• workforce housing
• vacancy taxes
• land use policies
• insurance challenges
• wildfire mitigation requirements
• the role of Realtors in public policy
• and why local elections matter more than many people realize

This episode offers a practical look at how legislation affects everyday property owners and why Colorado's future housing challenges will require thoughtful collaboration across political lines.

In This Episode

• Why lobbyists serve as "institutional memory" in government
• The biggest housing issues discussed during the 2026 legislative session
• How unintended consequences impact housing policy
• Why Colorado faces a housing shortage of more than 100,000 units
• The debate around vacancy taxes and property rights
• Workforce housing challenges in Colorado mountain towns
• Why insurance availability may be the biggest housing issue facing Colorado
• The growing impact of wildfire mitigation requirements
• How post-closing occupancy agreements affect buyers and sellers
• Why getting to know candidates before elections matters

Memorable Quotes

"Lobbyists are institutional memory."

"We understand your intent, but the real-world application may produce the opposite result."

"Insurance keeps me up at night."

"Politics trumps policy every single time."

"The best time to meet your friends is before you need them."

Guest Information

Brian Tanner
 Vice President of Public Policy
 Colorado Association of Realtors

Website: http://www.coloradorealtors.com

Real Estate in the Rockies is the podcast exploring Colorado mountain real estate, housing, land use, development, zoning, community growth, and mountain living in Salida, Buena Vista, Chaffee County, and communities across the Rockies.

Hosted by Colorado real estate attorney Ashley Kappel and local realtor Jessica Chariton, the show brings together developers, community leaders, housing experts, investors, and local voices to break down the conversations shaping mountain towns today.

Whether you’re buying property in Colorado, navigating real estate development, exploring affordable housing challenges, or simply interested in the future of mountain communities, Real Estate in the Rockies delivers real conversations and local insight from the people living and working in these communities every day.

Subscribe on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify for new episodes every week.

Connect with Jessica: https://jessicachariton.homesmartpreferredrealty.com/

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Please share this podcast with anyone who is interested in Real Estate development, Community Conversations about living in Colorado Mountain Towns. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hi, I'm Jessica Territon. I'm here with my co-host, Ashley Cappel, we're the Real Estate in the Rockies podcast. And today we interviewed Brian Tanner, who is the vice president of public policy at our Colorado Association of Realtors, of which I'm a member. He has been really influential in helping our Realtor Association interact with legislators at the Capitol and really shaping what we accomplish as a lobbyist group in the state. And so I thought it would be interesting, since the legislative session for 2026 just concluded, to have a quick review of some of the bills that passed or didn't pass and how that whole system works. I think we discussed a lot of really interesting things that we hope you've learned something from. Welcome to Real Estate in the Rockies, a Colorado real estate podcast focused on Mountaintown real estate. I'm Ashley Capel, real estate attorney. And I'm Jessica Terrington, local realtor. And we're here to help you understand what's really happening in the Rockies. You're getting both the legal perspective and real-world experience so you can make smarter, more confident decisions in the Colorado real estate market.

SPEAKER_02 1:17

Share it with someone who cares about the future of our town community. In the Rockies, real estate isn't just about property, it's about community.

SPEAKER_01 1:30

Today we are going to interview Brian Tanner. We're really grateful that you're willing to meet with us. You've had a busy morning interviewing candidates for governor with the Colorado Association of Realtors interview panel. So can you give us your title and tell us a little bit about your job?

SPEAKER_00 1:50

Yep. Happy. And again, thank you for having me. So I'm Brian Tanner. I'm the vice president of public policy for the Colorado Association of Realtors, which essentially says, I oversee everything in terms of government affairs. So from a policy standpoint, from under the dome, to all of our electoral efforts. So things at the ballot box, things at the local level, the state level, federal. We work with the National Association of Realtors and local associations. Anything that is going to be considered political policy is something that's going to be within my realm in terms of the work that I do. I am one of probably the few folks out there that is putting to putting my political science degree to use. Again, a lot of work in terms of translating policy to actually impact in terms of the work that it affects our members and licensees.

SPEAKER_01 3:03

A lot of political science degrees go on to become attorneys. That's true.

SPEAKER_02 3:08

I was not a political science major, but yes, that's true.

SPEAKER_01 3:13

We at Colorado Association of Realtors are always really grateful for the role you play. Just I'm a member of Colorado Association of Realtors.

SPEAKER_00 3:21

So look, I think it's important to again, I have to highlight, I am not a realtor. I'm not a licensee. And so sometimes people think, oh, you've you've been in the field of mic. My expertise is in terms of the political system. And really my my role, like again, is talking with you, Jessica, our lipsted policy committee, about taking your experience and in terms of the practical applications of these policies and regulations, and then tailoring it to an audience who, again, as you know, our elected officials actually have very little practical experience. So, how do I translate real-world experience to the policy standpoint is a lot of the work I do, but I don't have that licensee background.

SPEAKER_01 4:04

Yeah. And I think one thing I didn't realize until I worked with the Color Association Realtors on these political impactful things was how how the people who are elected, they have a they do have a very narrow experience. So it is important to have lobbyists and different sectors giving input and sharing wisdom and advice and helping us make good decisions. And it's they're not, I'm not saying that in a critical way. It's just one person can only have so much real world experience and only one career and all of those sorts of things. And so they they need some input. I used to think lobbyists were like bad. When like the lobbyists, it's like a dirty word. They spend a lot of money and and then get their way with people that are in positions of power. But in reality, it's a necessary part of our political system. So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:02

It is if and if you don't mind, I just will piggyback. In many ways, lobbyists are institutional memory. Um we have term limits in our state, which again, I think is a good thing in terms of getting fresh perspectives with new voices. But you have folks being like, hey, look, we tried this 10 years ago, and this is why it didn't wasn't successful then. You should at least know that. Uh so we do we're a lot of of sort of the memory bank of past policies issue, or why did we do that? Why is this on the books now from 10 or 15 years ago? So that's I think the lobbyists, we do a lot of a lot of education. The the phrase is this is legislators and elected officials, their knowledge runs an inch deep and a mile wide. Uh, and that's so true. So if you want to get below the surface in terms of the actual impact, it takes a little more time and sort of giving them real world examples as to like how this policy could uh harm or help uh in a certain field.

SPEAKER_01 5:56

That's a great explanation.

SPEAKER_02 5:58

Yeah. So let's jump into our questions. So Colorado lawmakers introduced more than 400 bills this session, and the Colorado Association of Realtors or CAR, which we'll call we'll refer to that at in this session, tracked over 40 with direct implications on housing, property rights, development insurance, and real estate transactions. So, from your perspective, what's the single big biggest theme of this session for Colorado property owners in the real estate industry this this year?

SPEAKER_00 6:36

Uh I'm I'm happy to report. And again, I actually think the number might be even a little bit higher. I think you're closer to more than 600 out there. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 6:45

Maybe our numbers are outdated. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:49

It is like a lot of bills. So each lawmaker essentially gets five, right? They get five bills, you've got a hundred lawmakers. Uh, and then there's all these committee bills and late bills and stuff like that. From uh from both uh real estate in terms of realtors and in terms of the impact on consumers and the kind, it I think it was a very successful year in terms of protecting property rights. Uh, we were able to defeat some bad bills that would have been harmful to housing providers or landlords. Um, and we got some, I think, really like good improvements. Like we helped pass some bills that I think are going to make an impact uh and be beneficial out there. So the the takeaway and what we're trying to communicate out is that it was actually a good 2026 session uh for both folks that work in the real estate profession in the field and for consumers who are looking to buy and sell in property transactions in Colorado. Yeah, that would be the very short, concise answer of it was good.

SPEAKER_01 7:45

We'll dig deeper. Yeah. Do you have like a something you noticed that was a recurring issue over and over? Like I know what I think of working on the legislative policy committee, but I'm curious to hear what you would say.

SPEAKER_00 8:02

And we we try to almost do buckets of bills. So just because you know this, we group bills by our subcommittees out there. Um, and for folks who don't know, how we group ours just internally of all the bills, we've got a housing subcommittee, we've got a land use subcommittee, we've got a regulatory, we've got a water subcommittee, um, and then we've got a business and taxation. Those are the five buckets that we group bills in. Um with every year, I'll just start with the one that is tends to be most the most challenging is around the sort of what we call landlord or tenant bills. We see a we always see a handful, if not more, bills in that space. Uh in part, look, it part of it's our political composition. Um, our state is overwhelmingly has democratic majorities in both the House and the Senate. Uh, there's a lot of calls for action from various interest groups to protect tenants. So there's a lot of bills that are looking to expand protections for tenants out there, which again, we are not opposed to that, but it's in terms it sometimes comes at the expense of the actual housing provider and actually definitely impedes and erodes rights in terms of property rights. And so we try to bring that perspective of we understand your intent here is to help, you know, help tenants in terms of housing protections, but you actually might be causing rent to increase and you might actually be reducing the available rental stock if people are selling those rental properties because they're just done with all the regulations. And now you've got an owner-occupied property that's one fewer, fewer residence that that could be a rental property. So we talk a lot about unintended consequences and be like, we understand your intent, but the actual application in the real world is going to go against what you're looking for in this bill. So that's always been a big bucket. We've talked a lot about taxes this year. Taxes has been one of the mainframes, sort of big pieces. Um just in that piece, uh again, the state budget is is again not as well off as it was. There's growth, there's other issues that are outside of our sort of uh outside of our lane that are that are driving costs up in terms of state government stuff out there, but that trickles down to local governments as well. And so we saw a kind of a flurry of bills in the local government revenue space. Vacancy tax was one of the ones out there where local governments wanted to add this tool or go to voters and ask them to enact a vacancy tax on properties and really give them carte blanche in terms of what because the question that everyone always asks, and it's a fair question, how are you defining vacant? Like, what's what does that mean? And this would be up to every local community. So it could be a certain number of days, it could be certain rooms. Um, there's no there's no clear in terms of like how are you tracking if a property is vacant, which people get, and rightly so, very weirded out. It's very big brother asset. Like, how's the government knowing my property is is vacant or not? Uh, there's some affidavits and things out there, but that is something that we find is going to be harmful. Um, and we keep, we actually flagged, I mean, like, we understand your intent is to go after like second homeowners. But again, these are people who are paying property taxes. And if they're not using our schools and if they're not using our roads, but they're still paying property taxes, that does help that local community in providing services. Um, and again, it part of it's like the intent and the impact is very limited. So that's one. We talked about a land use tax, which is a simplification about different mill levy rates depending upon uh, you know, kind of different mill every rates for property tax calculations. That's what's going to be like a highest and best use of your property, which is, I will just say this, it's very, you know, I-25 front range centric. But if you're an older property owner who's got a larger lot, but you might have a 1950s home on a larger lot, you essentially could be penalized because you haven't scraped your property down and put up a five, six thousand square foot property on a tighter property line. And so this is where we were flagging. We're like, people on fixed incomes could be harmed by this new taxation of like, how much land are you using and are you not using enough of it in terms of your current sort of property structure? So a lot of a lot of education, and we wrote to defeat these bills. So I just want to flag without giving bill numbers, which is a really bad habit in our space, as Jessica knows, you know, this bill around vacancy tax, a bill around land tax, we were able to defeat. And I think those are some things that helped consumers, helped property owners across the state that we want to flag.

SPEAKER_01 12:36

Yeah. I I would agree the theme to me during legislative session was trying to protect property owner rights and therefore protect the person that can't afford to live in Colorado. Because as soon as we're nickel and diming and more like million-dollar and thousand-dollaring property owners, it makes it really difficult to keep rent rates at a normal level. And it also drives landlords out of our state. And then they go invest somewhere else, and we don't have those rental properties that we need for the people that aren't going to buy. So it's it's really it's very interesting to watch the intent be so far off from the actual implication of the bill. But you know, there's lots of lots of good things to learn in all of the bills that are presented, in my opinion. So um, so early in the session, um, Clark Association of Realtors backed some big housing measures, and I I won't say the bill names, she said. But expanding workforce housing tax credits. Is it helpful to you if I say the bill names, Brian? Uh sure.

SPEAKER_00 13:50

Like I've got my I've got the bill sheet here.

SPEAKER_01 13:52

So SB001 and HB1001, which aim to streamline residential development approvals and reduce barriers to building housing. Um, and at the same time, car-opposed measures like the vacancy tax that you just mentioned on underutilized homes and at the land-based mill levy tax that you also just mentioned. So, how do we draw that line between government policies that genuinely help and ones that are going to create unintended harm to our economy, to our tourist base, because that's a big part of Colorado's economy, um, to our landlords, property owners. Like, where's that line? And how do we figure that out? I like what you said earlier. I guess maybe bring that back into it is the long-term memory of our group.

SPEAKER_02 14:45

So anyway, I want to just add a follow-up to that, just especially in mountain towns, which our podcast is focused around where housing supply is constrained and construction costs are high. Just thinking about that too.

SPEAKER_00 15:01

Well, it's again, this is where we talk about uh the cost of housing over on Colorado. Again, I think the the figures I've seen were for 48th in terms of housing affordability. And it's it's not rocket science. Um and the the thing that we we have been working as an association on is in terms of how do we how do we help improve inventory? Again, as as we've got constrained, and again, especially in mountain communities, like how do we help in terms of workforce housing, which is some of the tax credits of like how do we how do we use the sort of revenue tools that we currently have in our system with tax credits or rebates or discounts in terms of spurring development and like encouraging development to get more units online at all price points. So we need all we need a wide spectrum of housing things out there. The state demographer says we've got a shortage of about 106,000 units. Um, and that's across the state. It's not just the Denver Metro area, it is across the state um in terms of the need out there.

SPEAKER_01 16:00

I would say it's especially in our mountain towns.

SPEAKER_00 16:03

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 16:04

You said 106,000 units.

SPEAKER_00 16:07

106,000 units, and that's probably the state demographer being conservative. Um, we have seen figures that are well into the 125, 150, but 106 is what the official nonpartisan state demographer has tagged as our current housing unit shortage.

SPEAKER_01 16:24

Wow, that's really interesting. So anything the line, then I'm gonna summarize a little bit what you said, and correct me if I'm wrong. Anything that spurs that growth and development, which some people in Colorado are against but creates price points, all different price points of housing. While anything that's harming that housing base, and we know that from our long-term memory, is where we are trying to draw the line. That's complicated.

SPEAKER_00 16:55

I think, I think, yep, I think you I think you captured captured the sort of complicated mess that we operate year in and year out with a whole different batch of legislators next year. We've got elections going on. We will have a brand new batch of baby lawmakers. Yes. And we'll we'll have wonderful ideas and concepts. Uh, but again, this is where the practical applications of some of these wonderful ideas, we may have to do some education, uh, again, in informing about the the damages or the unintended consequences that could happen with certain policies.

SPEAKER_02 17:29

Very interesting. Yeah. So shifting to another topic, one bill that flew under the radar but affects real people every day was Senate Bill 54. And that passed unanimously and addressed post-closing occupancy agreements, where a seller remains in the home temporarily after closing. That's incredibly common in Colorado Mountain communities like Silida and BB and Steamboat and Summit County, where moving logistics, construction delays, weather timing gaps are uh can complicate the transaction. Um, can you explain what was actually broken under the existing law, what risk buyers and sellers were facing, and how the legislative fix changes real real estate transactions going forward?

SPEAKER_00 18:15

Yeah, I'm happy to. This is a bill that we helped lead just because, and again, it goes back to I mentioned the flurry of bills that we see, see in that sort of uh tenant landlord sort of space out there. Sure. Um there's a law, like again, there's been a number of laws passed in recent years around security deposits. Uh, whether to either cap the amount on a certain at a certain dollar amount, uh certain period of time, like again, you spread the security deposit out over 12 months. We've seen bills around that. Uh but essentially what happened was that security deposits are now were tied to rent, like as a percentage of I think one month of rent. Um but problem is with again, what happened is in terms of post-closing occupancy agreements, you have a security deposit within that, right? Again, where again, hey, well, I'm gonna let you, I'm gonna let you stay in my property, my my property when I take ownership of it for a certain period of time. But at the same time, if there are damages that are incurred, there sure should be a deposit uh to offset any damages that may or may not happen. Is is if you're not charging rent, your rent is zero, which is again from a PCOA standpoint, that is uh always the case.

SPEAKER_02 19:23

And what's PCOA post-closing occupancy.

SPEAKER_01 19:26

Okay, there's a group of things. Sorry, I'm asking the question. We like our acronyms in real estate. Sorry, the alphabet's just for the benefit of listeners and me too.

SPEAKER_03 19:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:36

So post-closing occupancy agreement, if the rent is zero, by law, the security deposit should be zero. Right. Because it is a it is a based upon that figure.

SPEAKER_03 19:48

Sure.

SPEAKER_00 19:49

So we we said instead of Bill 54, we removed security deposits from all of the other sort of tenant landlord space out there. If it's part of a transaction, uh, if it's part of a post-closing occupancy agreement, you can have a security deposit that is that is not tied to rent. It can be that figure that's agreed upon between a buyer and a seller. Uh so from a transaction standpoint, you no longer have where again, there are workarounds. I think the whole thing is there's workarounds for practically everything. But uh we're seeing this, I think, in closing costs. And in some of the additional things like, well, we'll we'll have some money set aside for this, but it will not be an actual security deposit. This provides a cleaner sort of from a legal standpoint, a cleaner sort of of line to where you're not doing workarounds and which could expose a buyer or seller to unnecessary legal action. So we're we're happy, we're very happy about that, that piece. It yeah, it's just because you shared, it's not super exciting uh to the outside world, to the public. It's not making the front page of the newspaper. But from a transaction standpoint, um, it just makes things cleaner and it makes again, transactions are already complicated enough. Let's at least take one complication out of the formula and make it easier for both buyers and sellers. Some of the risk.

SPEAKER_02 21:04

Yeah, totally. Yeah, I even had that happen to me where I did the same thing and they didn't the washer broke after they had stayed there and we were kind of out of luck. So, you know, was that when you bought? We we we were sold sold and we let no, we bought and we let the sellers stay in the house for a couple months while they were trying to get their ducts in a row. And then when we moved in, the washer didn't break, the washer was broken. So we we had to pay for that because we didn't have any this was a few years ago before this was in in play. So issue that does affect people. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:46

And I think it's surprising, like it it is a common tool. And Jessica, you might the post closing options agreement for many people is is a powerful thing to help a transaction move forward. Um, if not, if you're literally

SPEAKER_01 22:00

Waiting, if you've got again pieces that have to kind of flow in the chart in terms of like, I really need to sell my place and then like I would say it's become even more important in the last two to three years because people have to use the equity in their property to buy with the interest rate being so high. So I've executed more post closing occupancy agreements than ever before. People literally are, you know, going from one property to the next, and they just you just can't do that in one day most of the time. So it's been it's become a really important piece of the transaction. Yeah. So there's a few fun, hot topics I'm gonna throw at you. I'm curious to hear your opinion. We have um AI, Colorado's new AI consumer protection law takes effect June 30th. We have wildfire risk and defensible space code requirements that are, you know, locally uh regulated, I guess, but that's really affecting the entire state. And especially with the last few, you know, five to ten years of some really bad fires that have damaged property and made people entirely vacate whole towns. And then we have with that wildfire risk, we also have insurance in general. Situations in other states, I think, have not just the wildfire risk, but like the California fires have even caused, it seems, insurance rates to go up in our area because insurance companies are trying to cover their costs. And you know, I've had deals that have almost fallen through because people can't find insurance that they can actually afford and still make the payments. So of these three issues, the AI regulatory things, the wildfire policies, and insurance availability and insurance costs, what is concerning you the most long term? What should we be keeping eyes on, especially as we go into next year and the next legislative session? What do you think?

SPEAKER_00 24:03

Uh, not to diminish any of the issues, but but front of mine, the most concerning hands down for me is insurance. Um again, insurance, and I think it's so important. We talk about this wild urban interface, the wooy of the subject. We've got about, I think it's either three or four million people who live within considered within a wooy. Um and again, a lot of the I-25 corridor is technically in a wildland urban interface. The the thing that I that I talked about is when you again, as you're looking at properties and a property becomes uninsurable, you can't you can't secure insurance, it doesn't affect just that property. Like again, you've got now like that neighborhood, uh, you've now got that community, you've got that zip code that has now been tagged as like uninsurable. Yeah, that is dangerous. It is a dangerous precedent that, again, transcends a single property transaction to now an entire zip code or a whole region of the state. Um, look, we have a love-hate relationship with insurers. Um, it can't, I think most people out there for various fields and reasons out, but we need private insurers in Colorado. So this is where we do a we do a delegate dance where we're like, we need uh not just a few, we need a whole competitive balance of private insurers. In part because some of like the they pay a percentage, the admitted insurers in Colorado pay towards our insurer of last resort, which is called the Fair Plan. The Fair Plan is a again, is a public option if you can't get insurance that you have to provide documentation that you've been denied three times. This is where you can go to the fair plan and get coverage up to $750,000 for a residential property. That figure it grows up to the millions in terms of commercial property. I don't have that exact figure, but it's significantly more. But you can't even qualify it for it until you provide proof that three again, admitted insurers have denied you coverage on your property, which is not a good thing, but at least it's not completely throwing off the entire market.

SPEAKER_01 26:05

Um and how did you say that's funded?

SPEAKER_00 26:08

It's funded through a fee. So admitted insurers pay like I only I again we'll need to double check this, but it's it's a small, it's a percentage. It's either two or three percent of fee uh that goes into this fund, this pool of funds for the fair plan.

SPEAKER_03 26:22

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 26:23

Um and it this is where you there's a whole website. I don't have the website front and center, sorry. It's okay.

SPEAKER_01 26:28

We can put it in the show notes later. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:30

If you just Google Fair Plan Colorado, there's actually a really great site that says like what it does and doesn't do and how you can apply if you can't get insurance out there.

SPEAKER_02 26:39

But but you said it was 750,000 is the max.

SPEAKER_00 26:43

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 26:44

So if you have a home that's worth more than 750,000, you're sort of out of luck.

SPEAKER_00 26:49

You are on your own in terms of that piece. So um now that said, we just found out again, we had our regional 11 conference. I found out that uh one of our neighboring states, uh, the cap for their sort of airplane, I think it was New Mexico, was 250,000 until just this year.

SPEAKER_01 27:06

So that is That's stuck in the 1990s.

SPEAKER_00 27:09

That is practically nothing in our market across our state.

SPEAKER_02 27:13

So that might cover two of your cars. I mean, I think two 750, correct me if I'm wrong, is around the average at the median price point in our county.

SPEAKER_00 27:21

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:22

Yeah, that's it.

SPEAKER_00 27:23

That's actually I mean, this thing, uh I think even the director, like the people with fair play, would have been like, this is not this is good coverage. Like this is an emergency stop gap to get something back on an investment, but it is not meant to make you whole. It is not something, and again, the premiums from what I've heard, there's it's not like the premiums are not sure, but from what we've heard and gathered, it is it's pretty high. Like it's significantly more. And again, you're capped at $750,000. So it is an insurer of last resort, and that's purely where it's at. Um, again, from the insurance piece of thing, and again, from our mountain communities out there, it's just so critical. A lot of our condos and our HOAs in our mountain resort communities, like again, if they go from uh a policy and then all of a sudden that policy increases by by three times, which is not unheard of. Now you're talking about a special assessment on condo owners in that HOA complex out there, and which could be a lot of people who are on fixed incomes or retirees.

SPEAKER_03 28:25

Oh, sure.

SPEAKER_00 28:26

And you're talking thousands of dollars as a special assessment. Now you've got a run on short sales and people looking to get out because they can't afford the insurance increase because they're on a fixed income. And we've got an aging population across our state. So when people are being hit with two, three times what they were expecting from a homeowner's insurance or property and casualty, that is that is punishing and punitive. And it's it is something that is concerning to me because we haven't found, I think, the right solution as to what we need to do. Um, they crack there's a bill that we again we sort of sort of supported and amended around creating a grant program to replace roofs. Hail damage is the number one driver of insurance loss. Again, hail storm on the I-25 or I-70 corridor, it's a billion dollars every time there's a major hailstorm. That is actually what's driving loss for insurers. Wildfire is a small component of that.

SPEAKER_02 29:20

Okay, that's interesting.

unknown 29:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:22

Uh Jessica, this is another thing too. You asked the first question was around some of the codes, wildfire resiliency code boards at the local level. This is where I think as an association, we are gonna have to do some more education about ripping off the band-aid, about um home and property and casual insurance rates have had been sort of arbitrarily low. And again, as building codes are becoming more stringent in terms of what you need to do for defensible space or home hardening, this is where we're ripping off the band aid, being like these are mitigation efforts that are required to like keep insurance in the state so that you have insurance on your number one investment. But the costs are going to be significant. Um, any argument instead of extra.

SPEAKER_01 30:09

Right.

SPEAKER_00 30:09

Well, and this is really important to note if you are retrofitting or renovating your house above a certain percentage and it's an existing property, these new codes that are coming from this wildfire residency code board are going to impact you. Um, and this is something that supersedes local sort of uh codes out there. It is a requirement uh to meet that. And again, the the the piece behind it's driving at is like we need better home hardening, divincible space so that if there is a wildfire, that it's not taking out thousands of properties and causing billions in terms of insurance losses. Wow. So yeah, insurance, insurance keeps me up at night in part because if we don't have admitted insurers, again, the use of all state state farms for rest, like the nationally known, you then get non-admitted insurers. And these are ones that are that are gonna provide you some coverage. But if they're if and again, higher premiums, but it's not guaranteed coverage. Like it's not like you've got a federal sort of banking to back up the losses. But if there's a run, if there's a a major catastrophic event, these are insurers that will go under and you're just at a loss. All those premiums you paid year after year after year in the maybe in the 10 to 15,000 range, your property, you're you no longer have coverage. Like, and your your home or property is not going to be replaced. So that's my concern is we're gonna see an influx of non-admitted insurers offering people these packages that are not guaranteed, just so that they can go to their to their lender and be like, I've got insurance, but when push comes to shove, it's really concerning that these properties will not be replaced. And we're seeing that in a lot of I think southeastern states where you see this influx of of non-admitted insurers.

unknown 32:05

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 32:05

Yeah, that makes me a little worried. Sorry, I wish I had some good news. Like, I don't know. I I mean it's important to know it's something I've been worrying about too, on a one-on-one basis with each client. It's like vetting that piece, the that deadline in the contract has become ever important. Because it used to be a deadline in the contract, you could just kind of gloss over almost like they found their insurance. It was the same guy that they've used for 20 years, and that works with the payment they need, and there we move on. But the insurance termination or insurance availability deadline in the contract is really key, and you can't miss it because it could affect whether or not they can afford the property because it's become so expensive. So pay attention to that.

SPEAKER_02 32:52

Um so we're gonna wrap up with a question about kind of what comes next. Uh, Governor Jared Pullis is entering his final year in office, and dozens of legislative seats, as you mentioned, are were filled by vacancy committee appointments. Or, well, you didn't mention this. You you just mentioned that there might be some new lawmakers, rather than general elections. And the 2026 2026 cycle could reshape more than 80 seats at the Capitol, as we understand it. Um, you've worked on campaigns ranging from school board races to presidential politics. So you probably understand both policy and electoral strategy. How does this post-session political environment shape what car priorities in terms prioritizes in terms of candidate support and advocacy? And for realtors, homeowners, and rural and mountain residents who care about property rights and housing affordability, insurance access, what should we be paying attention to as we evaluate who's going to be going to the electorate?

SPEAKER_00 33:59

Uh, great question. And because again, we're in that transition point. We just finished the 2026 session, and now it is election season. Uh, every candidate uh, you know, for every state house seat is up. So you've got 65 state reps that are running for re-election or for just election. You've got, I think, 20 state senate seats, you've got, and this is the big one, all four constitutional offices. We will have a new governor, attorney general, secretary of state, and treasurer for the first time in eight years. So you're going back to 2018, you're going back to pre-census redistricting in terms of the top four offices in the state, um, which is going to be incredibly impactful for both people that are in the real estate profession and licensees, and for consumers and clients as to like what does the market look like uh in Colorado for starting in 2027, up until really 2030, which is a little mind-boggling to say 2030, but we're we're right there.

SPEAKER_01 34:58

Close enough. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:00

Um, the piece I I think the the takeaway that I would share with anybody on the planet um is get to know all of these candidates, get to know like who may very well be representing you under the dome in 2027. And I will say this as well you may not like that person. Uh, you may not agree with their like their leanings out there, but I cannot stress enough like how important it's to get to know them. And like again, we talked about that fractional knowledge around uh real estate housing and property rights. Even if you don't agree with them, it's important that they at least kind of know and hear what your experience uh in the profession is and what your experience with consumers has been, because it's doubtful that they have that same experience. Uh and now is the time. The best time to make friends is before you need them. So June through December is the best time to meet these folks in your neighborhoods, in your communities before they get to Denver, where there's a bubble. There's unequivocally, you get in a bubble because you're in those in that building a lot of hours each day for 120 days. Again, people rent apartments so that they can work their Monday through Friday. So it helps to sort of break down that bubble when people get to know the candidates now.

SPEAKER_03 36:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:15

Um, you know, again, I just mentioned about the institutional memory that lobbyists bring with the turnover there. Uh, we'll see that again in 2027. We'll have a lot of people with new ideas and concepts that maybe not so new or so wise in terms of the unintended consequences out there. But I I think that's the piece. And the thing that I want to stress with everyone, because people get frustrated with us, Jessica. You know this. We've we've preached this before. Um, politics trumps policy every single time. You can have the perfect policy on paper that will make a world of difference. But if you don't have the right politics lining up with that policy, it will get anywhere. Yeah. And it people were just surprised about how math drives a lot of our political decision making, is because you've got to count to certain numbers. You've got to count to 33, 18, and one for a bill to pass. Uh, 33 is half the number in the House, 18 is half the number in the Senate of 35, and then the governor's office, which will have a new, a new governor. But if you can't count to those numbers and you have a really horrible, no good, very bad bill that is going to pass. This is where we get into what we call like amend positions. Like, well, all right, this is a horrible bill, but we cannot allow it to pass in its current form. So, how do we do damage control? How do we get amendments to make this bad bill better? Uh, which is tough. It's tough for people that are like, why don't you just fight to kill it? I'm like, well, the math isn't there. We can't count to those numbers to like defeat that. So who's in office in January of 2027, who gets elected this November, is gonna affect the math. It's gonna affect the 33, 18, and one. And right now, Democrats are one seat short of a supermajority in both chambers. That is the political reality of our state. That is our political composition. So that's I think the key takeaway is math drives a lot of our decisions because um we best policy, worst policy, the math lines up or doesn't line up, that's gonna drive decision making for our association.

SPEAKER_01 38:13

I I think something you touched on there that I have noticed being at the Capitol and working with legislators this session is that housing for the some part, I'm not gonna say for the most part, remains a somewhat nonpartisan issue where we can talk sense and say, okay, here's what's happened in the past, we have the data to prove it, and here's what needs to happen to create more housing, for example, like the workforce tax credits. So hopefully, or I feel hopeful that even if we have one party or the other in control, there's a lot of good that can be done and a lot of work that can be done at this level to create a state that does well with housing issues. So that's my goal.

SPEAKER_00 39:01

But look, and thank you just for flagging again for folks who don't know, like we pride ourselves on what we call realtor purple. Like where again, we work in the middle between blue Democrats and red Republicans, and like we look at that moderate sort of piece out there. And in fact, in terms of our questions that we ask candidates right now, again, we asked Republicans and Democrats, how are you going to work across the aisle? Democrats are like, you're in power, you're in the majority, but how are you going to reach across to engage people from uh again, your colleagues across the aisle? Republicans, you're in the minority. How are you going to work with Democrats to get policies passed or priorities passed for your caucus? So we are trying to figure out again that the space that are protecting sort of the real estate profession, protecting property rights, making ensuring that we have a housing inventory that grows and is not stagnant. Um, those are all, I think, pieces that we work as an association, which I will just tell you, tell you right now, we frustrate leadership in both parties. We must be doing something right because both leaders from both parties are wanting more for us. And we sometimes have to come and tell them like, we know this seat in this race is really important to you, but the person that's currently there has been really good for us and has been a good ally and something that we can collaborate on. And therefore we're going to back them. Um, and that comes sometimes comes with, you know, like uh, but we are always very transparent and like we're very clear about the folks that we work with, which I think pays dividends in the long term for the profession.

SPEAKER_01 40:32

Something, sorry, did you have something else? I feel like I'm have a million thoughts running through my head, but go ahead.

SPEAKER_02 40:38

You go ahead. I was gonna transition us to the closeout.

SPEAKER_01 40:42

There's one other thing that comes to mind, and that's that a majority of Colorado voters are actually registered independent.

SPEAKER_03 40:48

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 40:48

And it that's not necessarily always reflected in what we have going on in the House and the Senate, but there is a large population out there in our state that cares about these issues in a nonpartisan way. And I feel, and you said something a minute ago that uh I want to speak to for a second before we close this out too, and that's per protecting the realtor profession. And not just because I want to have a job for years to come, but also because we as realtors on a local, state, and national level, in my experience, do create some of that long-term memory through our profession. So there's new realtors every year, just like there's new legislatures, legislators, and having people in positions and associations at the local, state, or national level gives us an opportunity to really help the communities that we're in in a meaningful way, instead of just reinventing the wheel every couple of years. And so I um protecting the profession is an important note there, I think too, and working on a state level with people and figuring out like what do we really want to become as a state? And there's a lot of people registered as independent. I think it's like 69% of Colorado voters are registered independent now. That's a lot.

SPEAKER_00 42:10

It is definitely getting up there. Like I think it's I actually think it's just at right around 50%.

SPEAKER_01 42:16

Okay, well, I saw a majority. I should look up that number because I'm I I can't remember where I read it. It was a lot.

SPEAKER_00 42:23

Well, again, think about this. If for again, for how long? I mean, I've I have been in the state for I've got I've got two natives now. Um, but we used to be known as a third a third a third, a third Republican, third Democrat, third, third unaffiliated. Uh yes. And now again, half, half are in that uh more than half are in that unaffiliated. But then you've got again, both Democrats and Republicans are both under 25% in terms of registered voters. So Republicans are at 23%, Democrats are at 25%. Both those figures are under a million uh registered voters, where again, the unaffiliated, you're talking about close to 2 million unaffiliated independent voters out there. So that is the the trend, um, which I think has led to some frustration with state government, and rightly so. Uh and what we we we have to work through the process. We gotta do the political math and figure out policies because no matter what, you're gonna get 100 legislators that have ideas next January. And we got to make sure those policies match with what Colorado's want.

SPEAKER_01 43:24

So make friends now.

SPEAKER_00 43:26

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 43:27

When and when they're like excited to make friends because they're campaigning. So they're out, they're in our communities, they're ready to talk to us right now.

SPEAKER_02 43:37

Okay. So we're just gonna wrap up with a couple rapid fire questions that we like to ask our guests. Um so what was your first job before you became uh first job was at TCBY, slinging yogurt. TCBY haven't thought about that.

SPEAKER_00 43:54

Uh white chocolate mousse was the favorite sort of uh yogurt back in the TCBY days.

SPEAKER_01 43:59

That sounds good right now.

SPEAKER_02 44:00

Yeah, that sounds good. What would you be doing if you were not if you if money were no object professionally?

SPEAKER_00 44:08

Oh my god. Uh be I would be traveling with my family. Uh again, if money were no object. I mean, there's so many beautiful parts of the world in the United States. Um actually, I'm heading to Alaska here in about my goodness, like three days. It's it's the last state. I've been to 49 states. Wow. Alaska is my very last state to knock off on the list. So traveling. If I could travel and experience uh more of the world, the United States is fantastic, but if I could travel more internationally and bring my daughters along, that's what I would do with if money were no object.

SPEAKER_02 44:42

Cool. And the last one is what does home mean to you?

SPEAKER_00 44:49

Um, home to me is where uh one is where my daughters feel super comfortable, uh, where home is where I can kick off my shoes and just sort of veg out and like not think about politics, not engage with other people. Um as much as like I work and this is my profession out there, I I don't live and breathe politics. Like I wanna I wanted to see the abs win. I love watching sports. Sports is my mindless entertainment. I can just watch various sporting events uh and maybe not have a you know, basically a horse in the race, but it home to me is in terms of like where I'm most relaxed and where I can like let my hair down. Not that I have a lot of hair, but I can I can basically be relaxed and my kids are my kids are comfortable. Um, and they can also kind of be themselves and like feel safe and secure. So to me, that's that's home. I'm not sure if I'm getting right at the question there.

SPEAKER_01 45:49

That's perfect. There's no right answer to that question, but we get a lot of similar answers, which part of why I think it's a fun question to ask.

SPEAKER_02 45:56

Yeah. Thank you so much, Brian, for for taking your time.

SPEAKER_00 46:00

Yeah, we really appreciate it. Hey, uh, thank you for having me. And I'm I'm happy to be the the first uh that is not in the room physically with you for this this podcast. So uh thank you. I really appreciate you having some great questions. And I would just say it's always, always an ongoing dialogue whenever you're talking about politics, uh, which some people hate, but it's just a fact of life, uh, especially in terms of housing real estate public.

SPEAKER_02 46:28

Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Welcome to this episode of real estate Iraqi is brought to you by Collegiate Law and Mediators. Hi, I'm Asky Capital. I help people make smart informed decisions when it comes to real estate, especially when they're contracts. From contracts to land issues, I'm here to bring clarity and confidence to the legal side of your transaction. I offer legal services and mediation.