Believe it or not, apartment rents in metro Denver once were much more affordable than the country as a whole, until this decade, when that advantage disappeared.

Since the start of 2010, metro Denver apartment rents have risen at the fourth fastest pace in the country, pushing the region’s rents from 17 percent below the U.S. average to 8 percent above, according to RealPage, a real estate software firm based in Richardson, Texas.

Only San Jose, Oakland and San Francisco in northern California have seen their rents rise faster than metro Denver, which now ranks as the 17th most expensive out of the 50 largest apartment markets in the country.

The biggest increases in rents this decade locally have come in the suburbs, places like Thornton, Aurora and Wheat Ridge, not in Downtown Denver, Cherry Creek or the Highlands, neighborhoods where new luxury projects have popped up left and right.

“There’s a strong relationship between rent growth and construction activity, since delivery of..

After finally opening its long-awaited 16th Street Mall store in 2018, Target is shifting its financial focus away from the Central Business District in 2019 to invest big bucks in existing stores around Denver.

Ten Targets sprinkled across the greater metro area will be revamped this year with a handful more renovations on deck in 2020. In some cases, the work is already underway.

All told, the ultra-recognizable department store chain will invest $150 million in the Denver area over the next two years, Target officials told The Denver Post last week. It’s part of a nationwide effort that should impact 1,000 stores by the end of 2020. Denver’s $150 million budget is on par with major markets like Los Angeles and New York, officials say.

“Denver is a super important market for us,” Target’s senior vice president of properties Mark Schindele said. “It is getting one of our most substantial investments of any major metro in the country.”

Exteriors will be updated, but the majority of..