Like many sectors of the real estate market, the Ski property sector was pretty heavily overbuilt in some areas such as Bansko in Bulgaria, which has seen dramatic falls in values and is now littered with half finished construction projects.

Other, more exclusive areas that were already developed to maximum capacity before the boom years have see less damage done to their economy, but just about everywhere is suffering in the down turn. The premier real estate agent in Aspen, Sotheby’s International Realty went broke this year – in one of the most up market ski resorts in the United States – that does not happen in a healthy financial environment.

The one thing in most ski resorts favor, is lack of available land, but even the resorts most likely to succeed need steady “growth,” to survive. This unsustainable model that we have applied to all areas of the economy must eventually become unviable. Where that point is, is hard to predict exactly, but unless we change something we are going to reach it – if we have not already done so.

Ski properties tends to be used for a very small part of the year during skiing season – naturally enough. There is a demand for these properties during the summer months, but it tends to be extremely low demand. The number of gone-broke ski resorts in the US is quite stunning with some of them part finished and destined not to survive another winter with no maintenance.

A good example would be Tamarack ski resort in Idaho, which went broke to the tune of $300 million dollars in 2008. The dust finally settled this year, but there is no financing to complete the project and buyers who had paid for property on the development are now faced with owning a ski chalet that is on a resort with no snow (they were planning on making their own), no lifts and no infrastructure.

Tennis players Steffi Graf and Andre Agassi had planned to be involved with a Fairmont hotel and tennis club for summer use, but have since pulled out. Unfortunately, given the location of this one, it is likely to rot away because the maintenance costs are so high.

Given the ongoing financial crisis that is now all over and we are recovering from, I suspect we are going to see a few more of these resorts go under. There are an awful lot of ski properties for sale, and I do not see this sector being at the forefront of a recovery. In fact – if the climate change that is not happening continues to not happen, we may well find some of them failing for reasons not related to money.