Cherry Creek Condo Market: Why New Construction Won't Ease Prices

Drive past 185 Steele Street in Cherry Creek North right now and you will see a construction fence around what is becoming Colorado's first Waldorf Astoria-branded residential building. A few blocks over, renderings are circulating for a Four Seasons-branded condo tower that has not broken ground yet. Two hotel brands, two construction sites, and if you are a buyer hoping either one eases the entry price into this neighborhood, neither one will.

That is the part worth sitting with before you compare listings. Cherry Creek has not seen meaningful new condo supply in roughly two decades, and the two projects finally breaking that drought are both priced for buyers who do not need a mortgage calculator. Understanding why tells you more about what you are actually buying today than any median price on its own.

The Two Projects Actually Rising

The Waldorf Astoria Residences Denver Cherry Creek broke ground in November 2025 after developer Property Markets Group secured $107.5 million in construction financing from Maxim Capital Group that August. The building will hold 37 residences across five floors with one level of underground parking, designed by Denver-based Shears Adkins Rockmore in collaboration with architect Carlos Ott, with interiors by BAMO and Hyder Construction as general contractor. Dawn Raymond of Kentwood Real Estate is leading sales, and as of the project's groundbreaking coverage in Mile High CRE, the building was already more than 60 percent sold with limited inventory remaining. Completion is slated for the first quarter of 2028.

The Four Seasons Private Residences Cherry Creek is the second project, still at the announced stage as of mid-2026, planned for 41 units across eight floors. Neither project has published unit pricing publicly, but branded hotel-residence towers in this tier do not compete with a $700,000 starter condo. They compete with the penthouse at The Laurel, an existing Cherry Creek building where a unit sold for $10.1 million in October 2025, proof that buyers at this level are already active in the neighborhood's older stock.

Both projects sit at the very top of the market. Nothing about either one adds a single unit to the range where most buyers researching this neighborhood are actually shopping.

Why Nothing Else Is Coming

This is not a land shortage story, or at least not only that. It is a legal one. Colorado's 2001 Construction Defect Action Reform Act gave homeowners associations broad standing to sue builders over defects ranging from cosmetic finish complaints to genuine structural problems, and the litigation costs that followed made middle-market condo construction financially unworkable across the state for years. A Common Sense Institute analysis found the number of active condo developers in Colorado fell 84 percent, from 146 in 2007 to just 23 in 2022, a collapse tracked in detail by Summit Daily's reporting on the law's aftermath.

Dawn Raymond, who has represented multiple Cherry Creek projects including the Waldorf, put the practical result plainly in her comments to the Denver Gazette: in Cherry Creek, inventory is extremely limited. She added that outside of the Waldorf's remaining units, the pool of available condos in Cherry Creek North could be counted at around a dozen. She also noted that roughly ten construction projects are currently active in Cherry Creek, and outside the two condo towers, every one of them is an office building or an apartment complex. Nobody has been building condos here because for most of the last twenty years, the legal risk made it a losing bet for anyone but the developer with enough margin to absorb it.

The Fix Arrived. It Landed Somewhere Else.

Colorado lawmakers finally addressed this in 2025. Governor Jared Polis signed House Bill 25-1272, the Colorado American Dream Act, into law that May. As of August 6, 2025, a homeowners association now needs a 65 percent supermajority vote from unit owners before it can file a construction defect lawsuit, up from a simple majority, a change laid out in the Colorado Senate Democrats' own summary of the bill. Starting January 1, 2026, builders have also had the option to enroll in a new Multifamily Construction Incentive Program, trading enhanced warranties and third-party inspections for stronger legal protection against future claims.

Nine months into that program, the honest read is that it was built to unlock the kind of entry-level, middle-market condo construction that made sense in Colorado's growing suburbs and mountain towns, where land is cheaper and the math for a $400,000 unit can work. Cherry Creek's land costs do not support that math. The only projects that pencil here are ones priced high enough to absorb Cherry Creek's per-square-foot land value regardless of legal risk, which is exactly what the Waldorf and the Four Seasons are. The reform may eventually bring new condos to other parts of metro Denver. It is not going to bring a new $600,000 condo to Cherry Creek anytime soon, because that project was never going to get built here even without the old legal risk.

What That Means If You're Looking at an Existing Condo

If new supply is not coming to the price range most buyers are shopping in, the existing stock keeps its leverage. Over the three months ending June 2026, Cherry Creek homes sold for a median price of $1.6 million, moving in an average of 23 days compared to 36 days the year before, with 56 sales that June against 45 the prior year. That is a market where buyers are moving faster and sellers are seeing more activity, not less, in a neighborhood where the entry point for a condo still sits in the $500,000 to $700,000 range and single-family homes routinely clear $2 million.

There is a second consequence buyers should plan around directly. Because almost nothing new has been built in Cherry Creek for two decades, most of the condo stock you will actually tour is decades old. Colorado's Common Interest Ownership Act requires associations to provide standardized resale documents outlining dues, budgets, rules, and any planned special assessments or pending litigation. In a building stock this age, those documents carry more weight than they would in a newer market. A reserve study that looks thin, a roof or elevator system nearing the end of its life, or a special assessment already on the table are the kinds of details that show up in the paperwork long before they show up in a listing photo. Named buildings like The Laurel, 250 Columbine, North Creek Residences, and Cherry Creek Towers each carry their own maintenance history, and reviewing that history closely matters more here than it would in a neighborhood where half the inventory was built in the last five years.

What This Doesn't Change

None of this means Cherry Creek is a bad market to buy into. It means the ordinary assumption, that new construction eventually eases pricing pressure on existing inventory, does not apply here the way it might elsewhere in Denver. The legal fix that finally passed is real, and it may loosen supply constraints in other submarkets over the next several years. In Cherry Creek specifically, the two towers rising right now are answering a different question than the one most buyers are asking. If you are shopping in the range most people actually search in, you are shopping the existing stock, and you will be for a while.

A Few Questions Worth Asking Directly

Will the Waldorf Astoria or Four Seasons units be priced within reach of a typical Cherry Creek buyer? Neither project has published unit pricing publicly, but branded ultra-luxury residences at this scale, with a 37-unit building already more than 60 percent sold before completion, are not typically priced at the neighborhood's entry point.

Does the 2025 construction defect reform mean more condos are coming to Cherry Creek later? The reform makes middle-market condo construction more financially viable in markets where land costs support it. Cherry Creek's land values are among the highest in Denver, which is why the only projects currently moving forward here are priced at the top of the market rather than the middle.

If I'm buying an existing condo, what should I ask for beyond the standard disclosure packet? Ask specifically about the reserve study's current funding level and any special assessments discussed but not yet voted on. In a building stock this age, that conversation often reveals more than the HOA's stated monthly dues.

Cherry Creek's next few years will be shaped by two buildings most buyers will never live in. If you want a clearer read on what that means for the property you are actually considering, Debbie Niedergerke has been tracking this neighborhood closely enough to walk you through it property by property. Work with Debbie. Let's connect about your next move.