Celebrating its 40th ski season, Beaver Creek is undeniably the center of attention, its village a hub of activity revolving around an outdoor ice arena, common consumption areas for socially distanced après-ski parties, larger-than-life art installations, and a galleria of boutiques, not to mention the wide-open ski yard surrounding the resort’s signature lift and run, Centennial. Which makes it an attractive area for families looking for a ski retreat at the center of it all. 

“It’s easy access for families because everything returns to a central place,” says LIV Sotheby’s Vice President Managing Broker Dan Fitchett, who notes a surge in sales of properties, now that inventory is at an all-time low, that doesn’t exclude properties valued at $10 million or more. “Vail is more urban, while Beaver Creek and Bachelor Gulch, two miles from the highway, are more rural, quieter, a little less congested.”

Especially Bachelor Gulch, just west of Beaver Creek Village, where dozens of private ski-in/ski-out chateaus are scattered amid the aspen groves and the only sound, other than wind whispering through the trees, is the whir of the chairlift whisking skiers up the mountain from the Ritz-Carlton Bachelor Gulch, a luxurious lodge worthy of a national park with exceptional restaurants and one of the valley’s most vibrant après scenes. 

“You get more for your money in Bachelor Gulch than in Vail for a ski-in/ski-out property,” says Cathy Jones Coburn, branch broker of Slifer’s Bachelor Gulch office. “It’s a really special place. You’re living on the mountain; there’s only one way in and one way out. Owners from Florida, Texas, Chicago, and New York who came in June never left.”

They include Dan Zilberman, who was living in London when the pademic hit and decided to relocate the whole family to the 15-room, 9,600-square-foot chalet on Daybreak Ridge that they purchased in 2017 from the owner of the Ritz. “We got here on June 25, and we have no plan to leave,” says Zilberman, managing partner at a private equity firm who also is a professor at the Wharton School. “Covid was the impetus. Why live in a big, congested city when I could do Zoom meetings from anywhere? This is our family’s happy place, and if this is our family’s happy place, why not just move there?”

It’s been a hectic transition, with a fleet of contractor vehicles parked in the driveway as their ski house is renovated into a full-time residence. Now, instead of bucking London traffic, he can sit down for dinner with the family every night. Because his home is his office. 

Number of active listings on the market, at press time: 84

Median home price of active listings: $2.77M

Number of homes sold in 2020: 147

Median price of homes sold: $1.84M

Average number of days on the market: 241