McCormick Ranch · Buying a Home
Buying a Home in McCormick Ranch
Someone who walks the houses with you, tells you what is wrong with them, and negotiates like it is her own money.
The question that decides everything else
Before we look at a single house here, one thing: do you want a home that is finished, or do you want a project?
It sounds like a preference. In McCormick Ranch it is the whole search, because these homes went up largely through the 1970s and 1980s and fifty years is long enough for them to have diverged completely.
On one street you will find an essentially original home, one updated sensibly over the years, and one taken back to the studs and rebuilt into something contemporary behind the old roofline. All three come up in the same search at wildly different prices.
If you want to renovate, the raw material here is genuinely good and the lots are better than what the same money buys further north. If you do not, finished homes exist and you pay for somebody else having done the work. Both are reasonable. Drifting between them is what wastes months.
Talk to me before you start looking
Five kinds of home under one name
Traditional single-family is most of the Ranch, built through the 1970s and 1980s on lots generally larger than a builder would give you today, with a wider mix of architecture than any newer community.
Lake and greenbelt homes, where the position does most of the work and two houses on the same street can be a long way apart because one backs onto water.
Golf-course homes, looking at the two eighteen-hole courses without joining a private club.
Patio homes and townhomes, a substantial part of the community and regularly missed by people who assume McCormick Ranch means one thing.
Condominiums, the lowest-maintenance way into this part of Scottsdale.
Tell me which of those you are actually after and the search becomes manageable in an afternoon.
What you get that a newer community cannot sell you
The trees. That sounds slight until you have spent a weekend walking new-build streets with saplings in gravel.
This was planted in the early 1970s, which means full-grown trees, water and green that has had fifty years to establish. Nobody can build that. It is the single clearest advantage this community has over anywhere newer, and it is why people who move within McCormick Ranch tend to stay inside it.
Then the paths. Miles of walking and biking routes run through the greenbelts, linking the neighborhoods to the parks and the shops. For anybody who walks a dog or rides a bike, that is the amenity that gets used every day rather than the one in the brochure.
And the position. Central Scottsdale rather than north, so Old Town, the airport and the rest of the valley are all closer than from the communities further up.
Gates and dues, which work backwards from what you would expect
McCormick Ranch as a whole is not gated. The traditional single-family neighborhoods are open, connected by city streets, greenbelts and paths. Some patio home, townhome and condominium enclaves inside it do have gates. So if a gate matters, we narrow to those rather than searching the Ranch as a whole.
On dues, this community is the opposite of most and it surprises people. The master assessment is a couple of hundred dollars a year. Not a month.
The catch is that plenty of homes carry a second association on top, particularly the patio homes, townhomes and condominiums, covering a pool, common landscaping, private streets, exterior and roof maintenance, or insurance on shared structures. What each includes varies a great deal.
So the question is never what the McCormick Ranch HOA costs. It is what the total is on that specific home and what it actually buys. I pull the current figures before you write.
What I check on a home of this age
On a house built in 1978 the cosmetics are the least interesting part.
Roof and air conditioning. Both have known lifespans in this climate and both are numbers rather than worries. I want to know the age of each before you make an offer.
Electrical and plumbing. What has been updated and what is original, because on a home of this vintage that is a genuine difference.
What any addition actually was. Whether it was permitted and what the record says, because an unpermitted conversion becomes your problem when you sell.
The trees. Mature planting is an asset and neglected mature planting is a bill. A large tree that needs work is not a small expense.
I will tell you when a house is wrong for you even after you have decided you like it. I would rather lose a sale than watch somebody buy a project they did not want.
How the rest runs
The mechanics are Arizona's: what you sign before touring, the inspection period and what it gives you, when your earnest money stops being refundable. All of it here, in order.
Arriving from out of state adds a few things and those are here. Buying it as a second home changes the questions and that is here. Selling something to buy it means planning both sides together.
People looking here usually weigh it against Grayhawk and DC Ranch, which is really a choice between established and central or newer and north.
Call me on (480) 203-6605 and tell me whether you want a project. That genuinely is the whole first conversation.
Frequently Asked Questions
What should I decide before looking in McCormick Ranch?
Whether you want a finished home or a project. These went up largely through the 1970s and 1980s, so one street holds an original home, a sensibly updated one and one rebuilt to the studs, all at wildly different prices. If you want to renovate, the raw material is good and the lots beat what the same money buys further north. If you do not, finished homes exist and you pay for the work.
Is McCormick Ranch gated?
Not as a whole. The traditional single-family neighborhoods are open, connected by city streets, greenbelts and paths. Some patio home, townhome and condominium enclaves inside it do have gates, so if a gate matters we narrow to those rather than searching the community generally.
What are the HOA dues?
The master assessment is a couple of hundred dollars a year, not a month, which surprises people coming from newer communities. The catch is that many homes carry a second association on top, particularly patio homes, townhomes and condominiums, and what it covers varies. Ask for the total on the specific home rather than the master figure.
What should I check on a home this old?
Roof and air conditioning ages first, since both have known lifespans here and both are numbers rather than worries. Then what is original in the electrical and plumbing. Then whether any addition was permitted, because an unpermitted conversion becomes your problem when you sell. And the trees, since neglected mature planting is a real bill.
McCormick Ranch
What buying a home looks like in McCormick Ranch
Established central Scottsdale, built around lakes and golf, with mature landscaping and a wide range of home types.
McCormick Ranch was a working cattle and Arabian horse ranch before it was a neighborhood. It sold in 1970 and development started in the early 1970s, which makes it Scottsdale's original master-planned community.
Fifty years on, the thing it has that no newer community can buy is mature landscaping. Full-grown trees, water, and green that has had half a century to establish. A community built last year can copy the floor plans; it cannot copy a forty-year-old tree.
- The homes
- Five genuinely different products under one name: traditional single-family from the 1970s and 1980s on larger lots than a builder would give you now, homes backing onto the lakes or greenbelts, golf-course homes, patio homes and townhomes, and condominiums. More than forty individual neighborhood associations sit inside the community.
- Why people choose it
- People choose it for the mature landscaping and the central position rather than for newness. It is in central Scottsdale rather than north, which changes what is within ten minutes of the door, and the paths through the greenbelts are the amenity residents actually use daily.
- Schools people ask about
- Scottsdale Unified. The district is working through a reorganization at the moment, so confirm the current assignment for a specific address rather than relying on a listing or on last year's boundary.
- Getting around
- Central Scottsdale rather than north, so Old Town, the airport and the rest of the valley are all closer than they are from the communities further up. Hayden, Via Linda and Shea are the routes you will use. The greenbelt paths run for miles and connect the neighborhoods to the parks and the shops on foot.
- Nearby
- McCormick Ranch Golf Club with two eighteen-hole courses, the lakes and greenbelt paths, Comanche, Mountain View and Shoshone parks, and McCormick-Stillman Railroad Park, which exists because the McCormick family gave the city a hundred acres in 1967.
- The trade-off
- Against the north Scottsdale communities you are trading newer construction, dramatic terrain and preserve access for fifty years of mature landscaping and a central location. Against DC Ranch or Grayhawk you generally get more established character and a much lower master assessment, and you give up a single resident clubhouse, because the amenities here are spread through the community rather than gathered in one building.
The method
How we do it in McCormick Ranch
Buying a Home: keep exploring
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