One Aguilar, Colorado, pyramid-shaped home is designed to endure the worst: snowstorms, hurricanes, tornadoes and power failures. Disaster scenarios of all stripes.
Embedded into a 35-acre lot at 22010 Steffi Drive, the home was constructed in 1999 by an owner determined to survive it all, explained Code of the West Real Estate listing agent Kerry Campbell. In many ways, she explained, the fortified structure is “a complete prepper’s dream.” And it comes for $750,000, fully furnished.
The two-bedroom, two-and-a-half-bathroom residence is equipped for full off-grid living. When it last traded in the early 2000s, Campbell said, its California buyer — who used the property as a part-time home before recently decamping to Italy — outfitted the house to the hilt, making sure it “could be a self-sustaining property in the event that, you know, there’s a doomsday.”
That included the usual features — propane heat, a full solar array, a gas generator, a barn, narrow-aperture windows suited to withstand extreme weather, a 500-foot-deepwater well — plus a few extras. A deck wraps the home's middle, offering views of the surrounding Fishers Peak. There’s also a greenhouse where a buyer could grow their own food, a fully stocked bunker hidden behind a bookshelf (the space is encased in concrete and reinforced with steel bars) and, Campbell said, a buried irrigation line and space to install a seed bank where a buyer could store the heirloom varietals they might one day need to plant.
A lot of 'bang for your buck'
Although unusual, its striking triangular form was intentional. Pyramidal structures are known for their resilience, with their broad bases and narrowing tips. This one has a steel beam through its core for central support, and its primary bedroom is situated at an optimal one-third distance from the peak of the pyramid.
Inside, the home is well-appointed, Campbell explained. There’s a meditation room, an updated kitchen and a hydronic baseboard heating system. The home also sits in Big Horn Ranch, a secured, gated neighborhood of other houses on 35-acre lots, albeit one with “no covenants or association to govern you,” she said. “You have a community of people that are there if you need them.”
Still, Campbell said, it’s a small community. “Our wildlife population exceeds our people population.”
Although the home has received ample press attention from reporters who want to “feature the home because it’s very unique and it’s got a lot of architectural detail, it’s one of those properties that’s going to take the specific right buyer,” Campbell said.
Because of its intentional design and purpose, the residence is about 10 to 15 miles from the nearest grocery store (and plenty of those miles are on dirt and gravel roads). It is also spread across three of four different levels, depending on how you count them, Campbell said. “People hate steps these days.”
But, for the right buyer, the property and low cost of living in Aguilar give a lot of “bang for your buck,” Campbell said, estimating that annual taxes on the home hover around $600. “You put this house — with … that greenhouse, those amenities — anywhere else in Colorado … it’s a $1.5 to $2 million property.”