Living in Cottages North

Cottages North sits on Canyon View Drive, in the Green Valley part of west St. George. You reach it off Dixie Drive, about two miles south of Sunset Boulevard. The street runs west toward the open desert and ends where the pavement gives way to the Green Valley Loop trailhead. It is a settled, low-key corner, not a new-construction subdivision, and the homes are compact and single-level. That is exactly what draws the buyers who find it.

Daily life here runs on Sunset Boulevard and Dixie Drive. Lin's Fresh Market at 1930 West Sunset is about seven minutes out, and the Walgreens on Sunset is right there with it. Dixie Drive takes you down into historic downtown St. George in about ten minutes. You are on the quieter west side of town, close to the errands you run every week. The interstate is a quick drive away at the Bluff Street interchange.

What sets this street apart is the edge it sits on. Canyon View Drive dead-ends into one of the two ends of the Green Valley Loop and Bear Claw Poppy trail system, and the desert starts where the neighborhood stops. I'll be upfront about the pitch for Cottages North: it is an established Green Valley address with slickrock (smooth sandstone) riding and hiking off the end of the block.

Cottages North is a subdivision of compact homes, not big lots. County records list the homes as single-family, but the lots are small and the floor plans are efficient. Most have about three bedrooms, two baths, and an attached garage, all on one level. Recorded build years run from the late 1980s into the early 2000s, so it is a settled Green Valley neighborhood, not new construction.

The homes are small and everything is on one floor, so this has been one of the more affordable places to buy into Green Valley. Recent single-family listings on Canyon View Drive have sat well below the St. George median, and updated homes have run higher. In a subdivision this small, the two or three most similar recent sales tell you more than any citywide average. So I always check the current number against what is actually on the market.

Cottages North is part of the Washington County School District. On the district's map these streets are served by Arrowhead Elementary (grades K-5). From there, on the Dixie cone (a cone is the group of schools a student moves through), students go to Dixie Intermediate (grades 6-7), Dixie Middle (grades 8-9), and Dixie High (grades 10-12).

This street can fall on either side. For any home, ask the district which school it is assigned to now, and do not guess from a map. GreatSchools and Niche are outside sources that both publish school data you can weigh yourself. Utah Tech University is about twelve minutes east across town.

The most useful thing to know about Cottages North is that it is small. There are only a few recent sales to compare, so one recent sale can change the picture for the whole street. It never would in a 300-home subdivision. Compare against the wrong sale, or lean on a broad citywide average, and your number can be off in either direction.

So I work it the way a small market demands. I start from the most recent Cottages North sales, then look at similar single-level homes in the wider Green Valley area to fill in the picture. I adjust for condition, updates, and floor plan, and I do not treat the homes as if they were all the same. For a seller, the small number of sales works in your favor. If nothing else on the street is listed when you come to market, your home becomes the price buyers measure against. For a buyer, it means patience. The right single-level home may not come up for a while, and when it does, you want to make a quick, informed offer.