Pair try to sell landmark home in a tough market

MONUMENT - Pat Sheridan is between an elephant rock and a hard place.

He's in adjustable-mortgage-rate hell.

He loves his 1970s remodeled tin-roofed home and the Elephant Rock sandstone landmark in the backyard, but his mortgage rate could hit double digits in a year.

"I don't really want to sell it," Sheridan said, "but I'm never, ever, ever paying 12 percent interest."

That's where the 46-year-old land surveyor fears his 8.99 percent mortgage is headed. So, he posted an ad on Craigslist, headlined: "$999,000 Elephant Rock For Sale - House comes with it!"

He admits the price is a bit unrealistic. The appraiser he recently hired told him his spread was worth $285,000, elephant "trunk" included.

"To me it is worth a million dollars," Sheridan said, "but not to the mortgage lender. Like an appraiser said, they care about bedrooms and bathrooms."

The 1,300-square-foot home has one of each.

The El Paso County assessor's 2008 property data puts the market value of the home at $99,072 and the 2.5 acres it sits on at $145,000.

The natural formation resembling the profile of an elephant is near the El Paso County-Douglas County line and is a popular subject for artists. A mobile home park, poker club and children's book bear its namesake, as does Sheridan's business, Elephant Rock Surveying.

The roughly 80-foot-high elephant "head" has eye pits and jutting rocks that form small ears and a wide arch that gives shape to the trunk. Sheridan said much of the rock formation is on his property. The "tail" section, spanning several hundred feet, is on a neighbor's lot.

Other houses in the private, hilly area are in the rock's shadow, and a conservation easement prevents further growth on two sides. It is several miles of curvy road north of Colorado Highway 105 in the northwestern Tri-Lakes region. Below is a panoramic view from Palmer Lake to Pikes Peak.

Sheridan blames himself for the pickle.

He had a fixed rate when he refinanced two years ago to cash in the home's equity to pay off about $25,000 in bills. He said it seemed like a good idea at the time.

"I was foolish when I signed up for an adjustablerate mortgage, like a lot of other fools," he said. "I did it to myself. I can't blame anybody else."

If he refinances now on the $263,000 balance, he said he'd have to pay a prepayment penalty of about $15,000, which he refuses to pay, even for his sacred elephant.

He was single in 2002 when, after renting the place for several years, he paid $208,000 for the fixerupper. He later married his artist wife, Nikki, under the Elephant Rock arch. They have done extensive landscaping and renovating to the one-story frame home. It has exposed wood and timbers, thick wood floors, stained and leaded glass windows, a bank cashier's cage pantry, jetted tub and Elephant Rock paintings by Nikki. The exterior has a turret, decks and patios.

Other homes in the area are newer, bigger and double the price.

"It's the freak of the neighborhood," Pat Sheridan said of his home.

The rock is the jewel.

"People knock on the door and ask to take pictures," Nikki said. "When I moved here I'd heard about Elephant Rock and would get on the Santa Fe Trail to get a good view of it. I was fascinated by it. Never did I think I'd be living here."

For the painter and gardener, the chorus of songbirds make up for the bears that peep in the windows.

It's a paradise for her geologist husband as well. On the Craigslist ad, he touts the rock and wildlife. "If you scrape the house and start over," he wrote, "I'll understand."

He is hopeful for a buyer, even if he has to come down in price.

"You can't tell me nobody wants this place," he said.

For him, it's a matter of principle, the pride kind, not the money kind.

"I'm not going to be held hostage by a mortgage company that's trying to ride that 8.99 percent until the wheels fall off the wagon next year," he said.

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CONTACT THE WRITER: 636-0253 or andrea.brown@gazette.com