Blogs by Author - Brian Lee Burke

Nov 10, 2026 • 5 min read

How Buying a Home Changes Your Life: 8 Benefits of Owning in Colorado

The benefits of buying a home go far past a front door key. Homeownership in Colorado changes your monthly budget, your long-term wealth and your sense of stability. Here is how buying a home changes your life, the case personal-finance author Dave Ramsey makes for owning, and how our Home Loan Readiness Program gets you there if your credit or debt is not quite ready yet. If you are looking for

Home Buying

Tips & Advice

Recent Blogs

Aug 17, 2021 5 min read

Fixing Grease-Clogged Drains in a Colorado Home

A grease-clogged drain in a Colorado home in most cases clears with hot (not boiling) water, a stiff pour of baking soda followed by vinegar, and a plumbing snake for anything the first two do not move. Front Range hard water makes the problem worse than in a soft-water market: mineral buildup narrows the pipe over time, giving grease less room to pass through before it catches and hardens into a

Aug 15, 2021 8 min read

How to Read Colorado Housing Market Trends

Colorado home prices move on three things: how many buyers are looking, how many homes are for sale, and what it costs to borrow. Track those three numbers for your specific city instead of a national headline, and you will have a far better read on whether now is a good time to list or to buy on the Front Range.Prices rise when buyer demand outpaces the number of homes for sale, and soften when

Aug 15, 2021 11 min read

Top 5 Reasons Why You Have To Move Into Colorado

People move around for many different reasons. These reasons can be classified as economic, social, political, or environmental. Economic migration means movement in search of greener pastures, a better career, and a high-paying job, while social migration is moving in search of a better quality of life, perhaps with your family and friends. Political migration is moving to escape war or politica

Aug 13, 2021 6 min read

Starting a Home Business While Moving to Colorado

Moving to the Front Range and launching a home-based business at the same time is genuinely more manageable than it sounds, as long as the two timelines are planned together instead of colliding. The home search and the business launch share several of the same early decisions: budget, location and the physical space you'll actually work in every day.Yes, and many Front Range home-based businesse

Aug 12, 2021 8 min read

Most Profitable Home Improvements Before Selling in Colorado

The most profitable home improvements before selling a Colorado home are the ones that undo what the sun, hail and clay soil have done to it: exterior paint on the worn elevations, a cleaned and stained deck, a repaired roof, a water-wise front yard, one warm white through the interior and clean floors. Each one costs $100 to $12,000 on a Front Range home and each one removes a line from the buye

Aug 6, 2021 6 min read

Water Damage in your Denver Home from Floods and Heavy Rains

With the current flooding in the Denver Metro area, as a Real Estate Broker, you must know the facts about the groundwater that has risen or run through communities in Colorado. The north Denver area and Boulder area are affected most by the heavy rains.First, our thoughts go out to those who have lost so much in the recent flooding in Colorado. The response of the local Denver/Boulder neighborho

Aug 6, 2021 7 min read

Plumbing Issues New Colorado Homeowners Should Check

A new Colorado homeowner should check four things before the first winter: the sewer line, the water heater's age and scale buildup, the exposed pipes most prone to freezing, and any sign of an unpermitted repair from a previous owner. Colorado's expansive clay soil, hard water and hard freezes stress plumbing in ways that a home inspection from a warmer, softer-water state does not always catch.

Aug 5, 2021 6 min read

Ceiling Fans in Colorado Homes: Costs and Savings

Colorado's dry climate and wide day-to-night temperature swings make a ceiling fan more useful here than in a humid state: moving air feels cooler even at a lower air conditioning setting, and many older Denver metro homes still run without central air at all. Here is what a ceiling fan costs to install on the Front Range, how much it actually saves, and what to check before buying one.Yes. Low h

Aug 3, 2021 7 min read

Commute Math for Front Range Home Buyers: Real Drive Times

Drive time decides where a Front Range buyer should look before price does, because the same $650,000 buys a 25-minute commute in Centennial or a 65-minute one in Castle Rock, and the difference is about four hours a week and $14,000 a year. The Kenna Group runs the commute math with every buyer who works in downtown Denver, the Denver Tech Center, Boulder, Colorado Springs or at DIA. This post g

Aug 2, 2021 6 min read

Water Softeners for Front Range Colorado Homes

Front Range tap water runs from moderately hard to very hard, and the source determines which water softener setup fits a Colorado home. Denver Water delivers roughly 4 to 6 grains per gallon (gpg) of hardness across most of the metro area. Homes on well water in Douglas County, Elbert County and other communities that draw from the Denver Basin aquifers — Parker, Castle Rock, Franktown, Elizabet