At Premier Mortgage Funding, we've worked hard to make
getting a Colorado mortgage in Denver with us as simple
and efficient as possible. Please take the time to look
around our site and discover how we can help get you the
best, low cost Denver mortgage that will be the right
home loan for you. You can find additional information
about Denver, Colorado below.
Denver, the capital of Colorado, was established by a
party of prospectors on November 22, 1858, after a gold
discovery at the confluence of Cherry Creek and the South
Platte River. Town founders named the dusty crossroads
for James W. Denver, Governor of Kansas Territory, of
which eastern Colorado was then a part. Other gold discoveries
sparked a mass migration of some 100,000 in 1859-60, leading
the federal government to establish Colorado Territory
in 1861.
Before the great Colorado gold rush, the Rocky Mountains
offered little to attract settlers, except "hairy
bank notes," the beaver pelts prized by fur trappers,
traders and fashionably hatted gentlemen in Eastern America
and Europe. The gold rush changed that, as the rudely
dispossessed Cheyenne and Arapaho soon discovered.
The Mile High City’s aggressive leadership, spearheaded
by William N. Byers, founding editor of the Rocky Mountain
News, and Territorial Governor John Evans, insisted that
the Indians must go. After dispossessing the natives,
Denverites built a network of railroads that made their
town the banking, minting, supply and processing center
not only for Colorado, but for neighboring states. Between
1870 when the first railroads arrived and 1890, Denver
grew from 4,759 to 106,713. In a single generation, it
became the second most populous city in the West, second
only to San Francisco.
Although founded as the main supply town for Rocky Mountain
mining camps, Denver also emerged as a hub for high plains
agriculture. Denver’s breweries, bakeries, meat
packing and other food-processing plants made it the regional
agricultural center, as well as a manufacturing hub for
farm and ranch equipment, barbed wire, windmills, seed,
feed and harnesses.
The depression of 1893 and repeal of the Sherman Silver
Purchase Act abruptly ended Denver’s first boom.
Civic leaders began promoting economic diversity—growing
wheat and sugar beets, manufacturing, tourism and service
industries. The Denver Livestock Exchange and National
Western Stock Show confirmed the city’s role as
the "cow town" of the Rockies. Denver began
growing again after 1900, but at a slower rate. Stockyards,
brickyards, canneries, flour mills, leather and rubber
goods nourished the city. Of many Denver-area breweries,
only Coors has survived, becoming the nation’s third
largest sudsmaker.
Regional or national headquarters of many oil and gas
firms in the Mile High City fueled much of Denver’s
post-World War II growth and an eruption of 40- and 50-story
high-rise buildings downtown, during the 1970s. Denver’s
economic base has come to include skiing and tourism,
electronics, computers, aviation and the nation’s
largest telecommunications center. As the regional center
of a vast mountain and plain hinterland, Denver boasts
more federal employees than any city besides Washington,
D. C. Since the 1940s, the large federal center, augmented
by state and local government jobs, has somewhat stabilized
the city’s boom-and-bust cycle.
Sited on high plains at the eastern base of the Rocky
Mountains, Denver has a sunny, cool, dry climate, averaging
13 inches of precipitation a year. The sun shines 300
days a year, and the usually benign climate and nearby
Rocky Mountain playground have made tourism one of the
Mile High City’s economic mainstays. Warm chinook
winds warm the winters between snowstorms.
Visually, Denver is notable for it predominance of single-family
housing and its brick buildings. Good brick clay underlies
much of the area, while local lumber is soft, scarce and
inferior. Even in the poorest residential neighborhoods,
single-family, detached housing prevails, reflecting the
Western interest in "elbow room" and a spacious,
relatively flat, high plains site, where sprawling growth
is unimpeded by any large body of water or geographic
obstacle.
Denver’s 1970s energy boom spurred a proliferation
of suburban subdivisions, shopping malls and a second
office core in the suburban Denver Tech Center. Denver’s
traditional dependence on non-renewable natural resources
returned to haunt the city during the 1980s oil bust.
When the price of crude oil dropped from $39 to $9 a barrel,
Denver sank into a depression, losing population and experiencing
the highest office vacancy rate in the nation.
Notable institutions include the Denver Museum of Natural
History, the Denver Public Library, the Colorado History
Museum, the Denver Art Museum and the Denver Center for
the Performing Arts, as well as the U. S. Mint and major
league baseball, basketball, football, hockey and soccer
teams. Gun violence and crime, as well as smog, and traffic
congestion are among the principal problems.
As one of the most isolated major cities in the United
States, Denver always has been obsessed with transportation
systems. Fear of being bypassed began early when railroads
and later, airlines, originally avoided Denver because
of the 14,000-foot-high Rocky Mountain barrier just west
of town. To secure Denver’s place on national transportation
maps, the city opened a new $5 billion airport in 1995.
The 55-square-mile Denver International Airport is the
nation’s largest in terms of area and capacity for
growth, prompting boosters to call it the world’s
largest.
Denver is a sprawling city in a state of long distances
and mountainous obstacles. To tackle long distances and
tough terrain, Coloradans have become auto-dependent.
Denver has one of the highest per-capita motor vehicle
ownership rates in the country—with an average of
one licensed vehicle for every man, woman and child. In
the 1990s, Denver built an outer ring of freeways that
immediately became over-congested. Even after the Regional
Transportation District began building a light-rail system,
highway congestion remained the number-one complaint of
many Denverites.
In 2000, the metro area reached a population of 2.1 million,
three-fourths of whom live in the suburban counties—Adams,
Arapahoe, Boulder, Denver, Douglas and Jefferson. Roughly
20 percent of the core city population is Spanish-surnamed,
13 percent African-American, two percent Asian and one
percent Native American. Denver has elected Hispanic (Federico
Peña, 1983-91) and African-American (Wellington
Webb, 1991-2001) mayors in recent years and has enjoyed
relatively smooth race relations.
The Rocky Mountain metropolis boomed during the 1990s,
as the eastern suburb of Aurora became Colorado’s
third-largest city and the western suburb of Lakewood
became the fourth-largest. Even the core City and County
of Denver gained population in the 1990s for the first
time since the 1970s, climbing once again beyond the 500,000
mark. Thanks to landmark districts preserving venerable
business and residential areas, as well as the 1990s opening
in the core South Platte River Valley of Coors Baseball
Field, Elitch Gardens Amusement Park, Ocean Journey Aquarium,
Pepsi Athletic Center and many new housing projects, downtown
Denver is booming as well as its suburban fringe, at the
dawn of the 21st century.
Denver Real Estate and Mortgages in Denver,
Colorado
The real estate market in Colorado remains strong and
the demand for real estate and mortgages in Denver is
booming. Colorado continues to attract new residents from
around the country, drawn by Colorado's beauty and economy.
This population growth has resulted in a good rate of
appreciation in the Colorado real estate market. It has
never been easier to get a mortgage in Denver and mortgage
rates are at some of the lowest levels in decades.
If you live in Denver and are looking to buy a new home
or refinance your existing mortgage, we can help. Also,
if you are moving to Denver and need help with real estate
in Colorado or a Denver mortgage, please don't hesitate
to give us a call.
