"Renters by choice."
That is the phrase Brady Berlin, founder of a new Denver investment firm called Sweet Creek Capital, uses for the audience he is building 70 rental townhomes for inside The Canyons. He is not talking about people who cannot qualify for a mortgage. He is describing people who could buy in Castle Pines and are choosing not to, because the math and the timing do not line up. If you are trying to price a townhome purchase or a townhome listing in this submarket right now, that phrase is worth sitting with, because it points to something the median price cannot show you on its own.
The Sale That Almost Didn't Happen
Data for February 2026 showed Castle Pines single-family homes selling for close to $1 million, up 1.9 percent year over year, according to a Denver Metro Association of Realtors report covered by the Denver Gazette in March 2026. Townhomes told a quieter story: a median sale price near $550,000, down about 1 percent from the year before.
On paper, that reads like a stable, slightly softening attached-home market. It is not. The same reporting period showed that Castle Pines had only one townhome sale in the first two months of 2026. In the same January-through-February window in 2025, ten townhomes sold.
One sale cannot set a median in any meaningful sense. It can only report a single price. When a market goes from ten transactions to one in the same stretch of the calendar, the "down 1 percent" figure is not describing a cooling trend. It is describing a single data point standing in for what used to be a real sample size. An appraiser working a Canyons townhome deal this year has almost nothing recent to lean on, and a seller asking what the last one went for gets an answer that may not represent anything beyond that one closing.
Two Housing Types, Two Different Stories
Castle Pines' single-family segment is doing what a tight, amenity-rich Douglas County suburb usually does: prices near or above $1 million, still climbing modestly year over year. The Canyons' new-construction single-family product has kept that segment liquid because buyers at that budget level are still active, still comparing lots and floor plans against each other.
The townhome segment serves a different buyer, someone who wants access to Castle Pines schools, Rueter-Hess Reservoir, and the neighborhood's trail network without the price of a half-acre lot. That is exactly the buyer priced further out every time the single-family median climbs. The result in early 2026 was not a townhome price collapse. It was closer to a standoff. Owners who bought in the last few years have little reason to sell into a market with almost no recent comps to justify their number, and buyers who might purchase are waiting for enough sales to trust a price. Both sides are stuck watching for the other to move first.
The Developer Betting the Gap Is Permanent
Sweet Creek Capital is not waiting to see if that standoff resolves. Berlin, a University of Colorado Boulder graduate who previously worked as a director at a Denver homebuilder before launching his own firm earlier this year, picked The Canyons for his debut project, according to reporting from the Douglas County News-Press. The Peaks at Canyons will sit at the intersection of Canyonside Boulevard and Canyon Forge Drive, inside The Canyons master-planned community, and will bring 70 purpose-built rental townhomes to a submarket where only one comparable unit sold in the first two months of the year.
The unit mix is sized for the buyer being priced out of ownership rather than the buyer who cannot afford Castle Pines at all: 40 three-bedroom and 30 four-bedroom residences, ranging from 1,410 to 1,760 square feet, each with 3.5 bathrooms and a private two-car garage, finished with quartz countertops, vinyl plank flooring, smart home technology, and 9-foot ceilings. Oakwood Homes is the development partner, and construction financing is coming from FirstBank, now part of PNC. Completion is targeted for late 2027.
Berlin has been direct about who this is for:
"Positioned within a neighborhood where the average home price exceeds $1 million, residents of The Peaks at Canyons will have the opportunity to live in a premier master-planned environment without the cost or long-term commitment of homeownership."
That is not a pitch aimed at renters who cannot afford to buy anywhere. It is aimed squarely at the household that could afford a Canyons townhome and is choosing to rent one instead, at least for now. Berlin has described this kind of project as a bet on "supply-constrained, high-quality submarkets," a phrase that describes a segment where sales have nearly stopped and rental product has room to move in uncontested.
What Shows Up Before the Renters Do
The timeline matters here as much as the unit count. The Peaks at Canyons will not welcome its first residents until late 2027. Long before that, the amenity picture around it changes. A 102,000-plus-square-foot Life Time athletic club, under construction at Castle Pines Parkway and Canyonside Boulevard since June 2025, is on track to open in December 2026, according to the City of Castle Pines, with pickleball courts, an outdoor pool, a spa, and a cafe, and is expected to employ more than 300 people. It sits directly adjacent to where the rental townhomes will eventually stand, along with existing gathering spots like The Exchange Coffee House and Canyon House Kitchen + Cocktails.
| What's changing | When |
|---|---|
| Life Time athletic club opens | December 2026 |
| The Peaks at Canyons (70 rental townhomes) completes | Late 2027 |
For anyone weighing a Canyons townhome purchase this year, that gap is the useful part. Current owners and buyers get roughly a full year of the neighborhood's biggest amenity addition before a purpose-built rental competitor even opens its doors. Waiting for more data on townhome comps means waiting through the exact window when the area's amenity stack is improving fastest, which is not obviously the safer move.
What This Means If You Are Pricing an Offer Right Now
With a single closed sale to reference, a Canyons townhome buyer or seller cannot lean on recent comps the way they could two years ago. That has a few practical effects worth naming plainly.
Appraisals get harder. With almost no recent attached-home sales in the immediate area, an appraiser may pull from paired single-family comps, older townhome closings, or product in nearby Douglas County submarkets, any of which introduces more room for a lender's number to land below a negotiated price.
Sellers have less leverage to point at a stack of recent closings and say that is just what they're going for. A single data point does not carry the same weight in a negotiation that ten closings did a year ago, which gives a well-prepared buyer more room to ask about condition, upgrades, and timeline rather than accepting a number at face value.
Presentation matters more, not less, when comps are thin. A property that shows well, with clean staging and documented updates, gives an appraiser and a buyer something concrete to point to when the sales data around it is sparse. That is exactly the kind of gap professional staging and pricing strategy are built to close.
A Few Questions Worth Asking Before You Write an Offer
Does a $550,000 median mean Canyons townhomes are still affordable? It reflects one closed sale in early 2026, not a broad sample. Treat it as a data point, not a verdict on value.
Will The Peaks at Canyons hurt resale values for existing townhome owners? It is too early to say with confidence. The project targets renters, not buyers, so it may relieve pressure on the for-sale side by giving would-be buyers a rental option instead of competing directly for the same handful of listings. That is worth watching as leasing gets closer in 2027.
What actually changes the picture, and when? Life Time opens in December 2026 and adds the neighborhood's largest amenity in years. The Peaks at Canyons does not welcome residents until late 2027. Anyone timing a purchase around either event has roughly a year of daylight between the two.
If you are trying to make sense of what a Canyons townhome is actually worth this year, or you are deciding whether to list one into a market with almost no recent company, that is exactly the kind of read a local team should walk through with you line by line. Inleit Properties works Castle Pines and the surrounding Douglas County submarkets closely enough to tell you which comps still hold up and which ones do not. Start your home story with a personal consultation, and bring the questions above with you.
