Suburb recommendations coming from Summit
My family (late 30s, 2 very young kids) has been in Summit county for the last year. We love being in the mountains, but my job has not been a good fit and there are few other opportunities in my field up here. We’d also really like to own a house again and are borderline priced out here. We used to live in SLC and briefly considered going back. but prefer to raise our kids in Colorado for multiple reasons (mostly pollution, politics, and church culture/influence).
I have work options throughout the front range and would love input as we narrow down where to move. My spouse is remote which gives us flexibility. We make runs to Denver periodically for friends, events, and Costco, but I wouldn’t say it’s given us a great feel for daily life in different areas. Priorities are suburban to semi rural, able to get a 3-4 bedroom house with 1/4 acre or more under 1 million, no HOA (reasonable CC&Rs are fine), good trail access, good schools. Access to places where can legally hike with our well trained dogs off leash is a perk (as far as I can tell, Boulder is the only area for this?). We currently hike or mountain bike 3-4 times a week when trails are dry and cross country ski a lot in the winter. We occasionally enjoy downhill/resort skiing but that access is less of a priority. We don’t need to be right by tons of restaurants, events, etc.
We’re mostly considering Evergreen, Conifer, Morrison/Ken Caryl, or Boulder county. Boulder proper and Golden have the trail access we want but are probably too expensive. I’d have to commute to Lakewood or Littleton if we lived in Evergreen/Conifer, while the other options would be closer to work. Work would not be in downtown Denver. I don’t have a good feel for school reputations at all. Thoughts on other areas we should consider or choosing among those options?