This Is How Much It’ll Cost You To Live In ‘The Happiest Place On Earth,’ Disney’s First Residential Community
Disney adults have reason to rejoice — if they have deep pockets, that is.
Andrey_Popov | Shutterstock If you’ve ever taken a trip to a Disney theme park and felt like you didn’t want to leave the magic behind, it’s possible that you’ll no longer have to. According to a Realtor.com report, Disney announced their first Storyliving community in 2022, and now it’s ready for its first residents to move in.
It’s called Cotino, and it’s located in Rancho Mirage, California, close to Palm Springs in the Coachella Valley. Although it’s two hours away from Disneyland, its location is still significant. In a separate Realtor.com report, the outlet revealed that Walt Disney himself had several different vacation homes in Palm Springs.
Unsurprisingly, Cotino requires a Walt Disney-sized bank account to move in.
1,900 homes are planned for the development, but it’s starting off with a modest 300 in its first phase. The homes are being constructed by builders Davidson Communities, Shea Homes, and Woodbridge Pacific Group. And the price tag? Well, you might be better off just planning a trip to Disney World.
The first group of homes is known as the Cottage Collection. For this cadre of two-bedroom, two-bathroom houses, prices start from the mid-$1 million. Unfortunately, that’s as cheap as it gets in Cotino. Next up is the Grand Collection, which is comprised of houses with three to five bedrooms and as many as five bathrooms. Prices for this group start in the low $2 million range.
Finally, if you really want to go all out, you can purchase a home from the Estate Collection. These homes start in the upper $2 million and have three to five bedrooms and three to five full bathrooms. They were described by Realtor.com as “larger villa estates.”
If shelling out over $1 million for a house just doesn’t sound like it’s enough to you, there are other pricey amenities to consider.
Cotino includes The Artisan Club, a “voluntary club” that residents can join if they wish to. In all honesty, it sounds pretty great. Reporter Julie Taylor for Realtor.com said, “It has a restaurant, outdoor waterfront bar, pool, spa, fitness center, and pickleball courts. It also includes a creative studio that hosts club programming such as speakers, artists, and more.” To join the swanky Artisan Club, you must pay an initiation fee of $20,000, plus a yearly membership fee of $11,000.
Bill Davidson, the president of Davidson Communities, shared that most people who have bought homes in Cotino so far are huge Disney fans (not surprising) and from the West. But if you want to get in on the Disney community action from the East Coast, there’s an option for you, too. Disney is building a second Storyliving community, called Asteria, just outside Raleigh, North Carolina.
The house prices at Cotino sound outrageous, but how crazy are they really?
Few people can imagine paying over $1 million for, well, anything. But with the way housing prices are increasing, it may not be entirely insane. According to Zillow, the average value of a home in the U.S. is $360,727, which is a 0.1% increase from last year. Of course, that’s just the national median price. Location plays a large role in the actual price of a house.
Pavel Danilyuk | Pexels
Bankrate reported that the median home price in the state of California is actually $866,100. So, when you think about it, it’s really not that far off from $1 million. Plus, some people may feel like the ability to live in an exclusive community with special amenities should cost a bit more, so the price is right.
Whether the price of homes in Cotino is fair or not, it’s certainly not doing anything to help with the affordable housing crisis. Many argue that we need more affordable housing options so those in the middle and lower classes have better, more abundant choices. Cotino is basically the opposite of that — just another playground for the uber-rich.
Mary-Faith Martinez is a writer with a bachelor’s degree in English and Journalism who covers news, psychology, lifestyle, and human interest topics.
