Steamboat Springs, I’m begging you. My husband told me not to write this letter, and if I do, he made me promise not to read the comments. Please be kind because I’m not sure I can keep that promise.

The thing is, Steamboat, we’re losing our home.

We’ve lived here almost 10 years. My husband worked for the bus and the ski resort before the last nine-plus years in sales. No doubt you’ve seen his smiling face at the grocery store. I previously worked in hospitality and spent eight years working for the state.

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We are responsible, educated and hardworking with full-time year-round jobs. We’re clean, respectful and quiet. We’ve volunteered for local nonprofits, and I represented Steamboat at a national convention. We pay bills, patronize local restaurants and shops, support local health care and education, and we contribute how we can. We’ve made friends who are more like family in this town, people with whom we knit, meditate and play pickleball. This community is like no other, and living here has been the honor of a lifetime.

But, we’re losing our home.

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We’ve always been on time with our rent and our landlords said they’d let us live in their place forever, but then their situation changed. We put an offer in on a house in Oak Creek at asking price (over four times what it sold for six years ago) and were beat by someone who offered more in cash. We found an apartment that we were excited about, but we didn’t get it. That landlord said we were great, but competition is fierce.

Six months ago, I had brain surgery, and Routt County, you held us up. You made us feel so incredibly loved. We’ve received so much support from our amazing community here, and we’ve given so much of ourselves too. We are so grateful that this is our home.

But, there are no available affordable rentals or reasonably priced homes around to buy. Everyone knows, so many people are working hard to fix it, and yet we’re not sure we can hold on long enough to see it happen.

It feels like our home doesn’t want us anymore.

Steamboat Springs, I’m begging you to decide what kind of town we want to be. Do we want workers to be able to survive here?

Oh, and if you happen to have an affordable home available, call me!

Erin Biggs

Steamboat Springs