The 13 acres directly south of The Landmark sat mostly empty for close to two decades. A lower-density multifamily project once planned for that ground had a metropolitan district behind it, and when that district became tangled in an embezzlement case, the man at the center of it took his own life in Florida in 2013. The site stayed vacant while The Landmark's theaters, restaurants, and Comedy Works club filled in around it.

That history matters now because the same parcel broke ground again on June 4, 2026, this time as The Village at Landmark, a gated enclave of 90 detached single-family homes from Century Communities. The press coverage has been thorough on square footage, architecture, and price. It has said almost nothing about the one structure that decided how the last project on this ground actually worked, or failed to.

What's Actually Being Built Here

Century Communities, a homebuilder based in Greenwood Village, is developing two home collections on the site with plans ranging from 3,280 to 4,550 square feet, designed by Godden Sudik Architects. Every home is expected to include a basement, a three-bay garage, and options like private elevators and rooftop living space. Pricing is projected between $1.7 million and $3 million, with model homes starting construction later in 2026 and sales anticipated for spring 2027, according to the official groundbreaking announcement.

Todd Baker, Century's regional president, called the project rare for the city:

"Opportunities like this simply don't come along often in Greenwood Village."

He is not wrong about the scarcity. Greenwood Village is close to built out, single-family zoning is protective, and large parcels this close to the Denver Tech Center almost never come open. The Greenwood Village City Council approved the project's Site Development Plan, Special Use Permit, and Final Plat in late 2025, clearing the way for the June groundbreaking, according to Naked Denver's coverage of the approval.

What none of that coverage mentions, at least not yet, is whether the infrastructure inside this gated community, the roads, water lines, sewer, and shared amenities, will be paid for the way most new Colorado subdivisions of this size are paid for: through a metropolitan district that taxes the homeowners who move in.

How a Metro District Actually Works

A metropolitan district is a special taxing entity a developer forms to finance public infrastructure for a new subdivision. The district issues bonds to build the roads and utilities up front, then repays that debt over time through an additional property tax mill levy charged only to homes inside the district's boundary. It sits on top of, not instead of, the mill levies already charged by the city, the county, the school district, and the fire district.

Greenwood Village's own explainer on how property taxes work shows how small the city's own share actually is. On a $500,000 property, the city's mill levy of 2.932 produces a tax bill of just $91.63, according to the city's newsflash on property tax assessment. The city notes that it relies primarily on sales tax, not property tax, for its budget. That same city explainer shows that other taxing entities move a lot more, and a lot faster. For 2025, Arapahoe County's mill levy rose roughly 40 percent year over year, and South Metro Fire Rescue's rose roughly 30 percent, while Cherry Creek Schools moved less than half a percent.

A metropolitan district's debt-service mill levy can add substantially more than any of those individual increases in a single year, because it's sized to retire a bond, not to fund an annual budget. Colorado law caps most residential metro district debt-service mills and repayment terms, but the specific numbers live in each district's own service plan, filed with the approving municipality. For a 2026 service plan, that filing has to state the maximum mill levy the district can charge for debt and the maximum amount of debt it can issue, under the disclosure requirements in Senate Bill 23-110.

For a Village at Landmark buyer at the top of the announced price range, a district mill levy layered on top of city, county, school, and fire district levies is not a rounding error. It is the kind of number that changes a monthly payment by hundreds of dollars, for decades, and it will not show up on a portal listing photo.

The Timing Problem Baked Into the Law

Colorado does require disclosure. Since January 1, 2022, sellers of newly constructed homes inside a metropolitan district have had to give buyers specific information about the district's bonding capacity, its mill levy structure, and an estimate of what the buyer's actual property tax bill will look like once the home is built, according to a legal summary from Otten Johnson of the statute passed as part of Colorado's 2021 metro district reform bill. Sellers also have to hand over a current county assessor's tax certificate.

The problem is the word "concurrently." The law requires this disclosure no later than the date the buyer signs the sales contract. That means a buyer can spend months touring model homes, choosing a floor plan, picking finishes, and putting down earnest money before ever seeing the actual number. By the time the disclosure lands on the table, most buyers are already emotionally and financially committed to the deal. The statute protects the buyer's right to know. It does not protect the buyer's leverage to negotiate on it.

That's the gap this parcel's own history makes visible. The metro district behind the previous project on this exact ground became a matter of public controversy and criminal charges before it ever delivered a finished home. Nobody buying into that earlier plan could have known that in advance either.

What to Ask, and When to Ask It

None of this means The Village at Landmark is following the same path. It means a buyer serious about this community has real questions worth asking well before a contract is on the table, not just after.

• Has a metropolitan district service plan been filed with the City of Greenwood Village for this project, and if so, is it public yet?
• What is the maximum debt-service mill levy the plan allows, and for how many years can it be imposed?
• What is the total dollar amount of debt the district is authorized to issue?
• Who sits on the district's board today, and when does control transfer from the developer to the homeowners?
• Does the HOA charge separately from any district assessment, and what does each one actually cover?

A buyer's agent can request the service plan directly from the city or the district's own required public website once one exists, and can run the projected mill levy against the actual purchase price rather than a generic estimate.

What a Metro District Could Mean, in Real Numbers

The first four rows apply to nearly every home in the city, resale or new. The fifth row is what separates a resale purchase near The Landmark from a purchase inside a brand-new gated community built to fund its own roads and amenities. It's also the row a listing sheet is least likely to spell out in plain dollars.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does every new Colorado subdivision have a metropolitan district? Not every one, but it's the standard financing tool for developers building roads, water, and sewer infrastructure for a new subdivision, and it's common in projects of this scale. Whether this specific project uses one has not been detailed in public coverage of the groundbreaking as of this writing.

If a district exists, does the extra mill levy ever go away? Yes, once the bonds are paid off. Service plans set a maximum repayment term, and the district's debt-service mill levy is supposed to end when the debt is retired, though the timeline depends on the specific bonds issued and how quickly they're repaid.

Does a metro district affect resale value later? It can factor into how a future buyer compares the home's true carrying cost against a home without a district. That's exactly why understanding the mill levy structure now, before signing, matters as much for long-term value as for the first year's tax bill.

If you're weighing new construction at The Village at Landmark against an established home elsewhere in Greenwood Village, the honest comparison has to include what each option actually costs to hold, not just what it costs to buy. Ben Rule has spent years reading the fine print on Denver Metro new-construction contracts for buyers who'd rather ask the hard questions before they sign than after. Reach out for a tailored look at what a specific address, new or resale, would actually cost you to own.