Battlement Mesa

The challenge

While developing the Western Colorado rural community of Battlement Mesa, Exxon ran into a changing market: it became cost-prohibitive to extract oil reserves from shale. The job market collapsed and unemployment quickly rose to double-digit figures.

Could Exxon sustain the mixed-use community development of Battlement Mesa in a depressed economic environment? And separately: they needed an exit strategy for the property.

This is about as hard as an assignment gets. The community had been built for a workforce that no longer had work, and the housing stock doesn’t care why. No amount of advertising solves that, because there’s nobody left locally to advertise to.

So the opportunity had to come from somewhere else. The answer was to change who the community was for.

What we did

Our marketing and real estate companies were retained by Exxon to develop a strategic plan. It had three parts.

We found a different buyer. We redirected marketing toward active adults along Colorado’s Front Range and beyond, into the mid-western and central southern states. Here’s the thing worth noticing: everything that made Battlement Mesa a hard sell to a workforce — remote, quiet, full of amenities, inexpensive, nowhere near an employment center — reads almost exactly like what an active adult retirement buyer is looking for. Same product. Different buyer.

We built a broker channel. We created a Pathfinder program so real estate brokers across the state could register their customers with us in exchange for full commission. An on-site sales office can’t reach buyers hundreds of miles away on its own. Brokers already could, and paying them full commission cost far less than building that reach ourselves.

We made it easy to come and look. We converted apartment homes into a model guest suite hotel where prospective buyers could experience the community and its amenities inexpensively. Asking someone to move several states to a place they’ve never seen is an enormous ask. Asking them to come for a weekend is a small one — and with a lifestyle purchase, the visit does the selling no brochure ever will.

The result

The plan worked. In just two years and nine months, we attracted more than 11,900 prospective renters and buyers. We increased the population of the community by more than 1,000 residents.

We then assisted the developer in selling the community to another developer, who purchased it with builder, real estate broker, and consumer brand acceptance already established, and with homes for sale and for lease across many product and price segments.

That last part is what made the exit work. What Exxon handed over was a functioning community with a proven buyer, an active broker network, and absorption you could point to — a going concern, priced like one.

What you can use

• When demand disappears, take another look at who your buyer is before you touch the marketing.
• The same product can be a hard sell to one buyer and exactly right for another. Go find that buyer.
• If your buyers are far away, pay brokers properly. They already have the reach you’d spend years building.
• With a lifestyle purchase, make it cheap and easy to come and experience the place. The visit closes the sale.
• Getting an asset ready to sell and marketing it well are the same work, done in the right order.

In a similar spot? Call +1 303.500.3400 or send us a message.