Moving to Loveland, Colorado

What you are moving to

Loveland is a home-rule city of 76,378 people at the 2020 census, the second most populous in Larimer County and the 14th in Colorado, 46 miles north of the State Capitol in Denver. It sits at the base of the foothills just east of the mouth of the Big Thompson Canyon, where US 34 crosses US 287, at 4,997 feet, with Longs Peak in view from much of the city. The Colorado Central Railroad founded it beside the Big Thompson River in 1877 and named it for the railroad’s president, William A. H. Loveland; it was incorporated on April 30, 1881, lived on sugar beets and sour cherries for the first half of the twentieth century, and took in Hewlett-Packard, Teledyne and Hach late in the century. The long version is Loveland’s history. It had 66,859 people in 2010, and the Census Bureau estimates 81,387 for 2025. Fort Collins, the county seat, is to the north, and the two cities form one metropolitan area, with county-owned open space set aside in the 1990s as a buffer between them; Loveland’s northern limits now meet Windsor’s. To the east the city has annexed its way to I-25, where the US 34 interchange, shared with Johnstown, has become the commercial hub known as Centerra: shopping centers, a medical center, a mall and Blue Arena. The river has flooded the city twice in living memory: the Big Thompson flood of 1976 killed 144 people, and in September 2013 the swollen river collapsed sections of US 34 in the canyon and caused major flooding in Loveland. An average year brings 15.6 inches of precipitation and 47 inches of snow (1991–2020 normals).

Housing

The Loveland-based multiple-listing service IRES put the median sale price of a single-family home in the Loveland-Berthoud market at $535,000 in June 2026, 2.7 percent below June 2025, with 163 sales against 572 active listings, BizWest reported; the monthly median had held in the mid-$500,000s all year. The listings sites in the sidebar show what is for sale. On the east side, Centerra is the master-planned community at I-25 and US 34, 25 years in the making, with two neighborhoods: The Lakes, around two lakes and the High Plains Environmental Center, where the developer prices condominiums and townhomes from the $300s, and Kinston, with townhomes and single-family houses from the $500s to more than $1 million. Centerra has its own metropolitan district, which partnered with CDOT on the I-25 Bustang station that opened in 2024; in Centerra or any newer subdivision, ask whether the house is in a metro district and what its mill levy is. In the middle of the city, Lake Loveland is an early irrigation reservoir that now supplies water to Greeley; the homeowners around it hold its recreation rights, and the public can fish from the shorelines along Southshore Parkway and at North Lake Park. Two more questions are worth asking about any address: who supplies the water (below), and how close the house sits to the Big Thompson.

Schools

Loveland’s public schools are Thompson School District’s; it calls itself the 17th largest in Colorado: more than 15,000 students in 31 schools across 362 square miles, taking in Loveland, Berthoud and parts of Fort Collins, Johnstown and Windsor, and unincorporated parts of Larimer, Boulder and Weld counties. Its school directory lists four high schools in Loveland: Loveland High at 920 W. 29th Street, Mountain View at 3500 Mountain Lion Drive, Thompson Valley at 1669 Eagle Drive, and Harold Ferguson, which shares 1811 W. 15th Street with the Thompson Career Campus. Bill Reed, Lucile Erwin and Walt Clark are the Loveland middle schools, and twelve elementary schools have Loveland addresses. The district’s site also lists two charter schools, Loveland Classical Schools and New Vision Charter School, and children who turn 5 on or before October 1 can start kindergarten. Every student has a guaranteed seat at the neighborhood school for their address, which the School Locator finds (970-613-5663); Poudre School District also counts Loveland among the places it covers, so check the address with both. To attend another Thompson school, apply for Choice Enrollment: the window for 2027–28 runs from November 3, 2026, to January 29, 2027, eligible applications go into a lottery, a family offered a seat has five business days to accept, and the district almost never provides a bus to a choice school; Central Registration is 970-613-6877. In 2025 district voters approved a $99 million bond for roofs, secure entry vestibules, heating and cooling, and additions at Berthoud and Ivy Stockwell elementaries.

Getting around

By car. US 34 becomes Eisenhower Boulevard in the city and divides Loveland in half, with the two main ZIP codes, 80537 and 80538, on either side. Through town it is a four-lane expressway; west of town it runs up the Big Thompson Canyon to Estes Park and Rocky Mountain National Park, and downtown it crosses US 287, which runs south on Cleveland Avenue and north on Lincoln Avenue. On I-25, express lanes from Colorado 56 at Berthoud to Prospect Road in Fort Collins were substantially complete in December 2023, the Mead-to-Berthoud segment is under construction through 2028, and Bustang’s North Line between Fort Collins and downtown Denver stops at the Centerra-Loveland Mobility Hub, opened in October 2024 off the new Kendall Parkway north of the US 34 interchange, where passengers board on a platform between the northbound and southbound lanes. On Transfort’s FLEX timetable effective December 29, 2025, the regional bus runs on weekdays and Saturdays between Fort Collins, Loveland, Berthoud, Longmont and Boulder; its Loveland stops are the Loveland North Transit Center and 8th Street, on Cleveland Avenue southbound and Lincoln Avenue northbound, and on weekdays the first bus south leaves Loveland North at 5:31 am and the last one north gets back there at 9:40 pm. The same timetable gives 970-962-2429 for COLT, the city buses. Northern Colorado Regional Airport is owned jointly by Fort Collins and Loveland, with an 8,500-foot runway and charter flights. Off the road, the Long View Trail runs 4 paved miles beside Shields Street from Fort Collins to West 57th Street in Loveland, and the Fossil Creek Trail meets the Front Range Trail at Carpenter Road and Lemay Avenue, the way on to Boyd Lake State Park and the Loveland trails.

Utilities, trash, fire, police

Electricity comes from City of Loveland Utilities, which buys its power wholesale from Platte River Power Authority, the not-for-profit public power utility that Loveland, Estes Park, Fort Collins and Longmont set up together and that has supplied them since 1973.
Water comes from the City’s utility or, in parts of Loveland, from the Fort Collins-Loveland Water District, which serves more than 60,000 customers across about 60 square miles of Fort Collins, Loveland, Timnath, Windsor and the county; its office is 970-226-3104. Ask which before you sign.
Internet can come from Pulse, the City’s own fiber network, part of City of Loveland Utilities, started in Loveland in 2018 and since extended to Timnath and parts of Larimer County. Its plans run from 500 megabits for $50 a month to 10 gigabits for $179, with equal upload and download speeds, no long-term contract and free installation; those prices assume autopay from a bank account. Check availability at 970-541-4990.
Trash and recycling, police and City utility accounts: call 911 in an emergency; for the rest, see the City’s site, and ask the seller, landlord or HOA who collects trash at the address.
Fire and emergency medical response is the Loveland Fire Rescue Authority, formed by the City and the Loveland Rural Fire Protection District: 119 sworn members and 15 volunteers in ten stations, seven staffed around the clock with at least three people, two staffed by volunteers and one at the airport. An inclusion election in August 2025 added 60 square miles, and it now covers just over 110,000 people across 248 square miles, including parts of Johnstown, Masonville, the Big Thompson Canyon and Drake.

Government

Loveland is a home-rule city with a council-manager government. The City Council has nine members: a mayor elected citywide for two years, who presides and votes like the others, and two council members from each of four wards, elected for four years after living in the ward for the 12 months before the election. The council chooses a mayor pro tem from among its members. Wikipedia, citing the City’s pages in February 2026, lists Patrick McFall as mayor, Andrea Samson as mayor pro tem and Jim Thompson as city manager; for the current council, meeting times and agendas, see the City’s site. The City’s reach goes past City Hall: Pulse and the electric and water utilities above, and the Cultural Services Department, which runs the Rialto Theater Center. Fire is governed separately: the Loveland Fire Rescue Authority has its own board and a citizen Fire Rescue Advisory Commission, and its October 2026 calendar has the commission on Wednesday the 7th, the Loveland Rural Fire Protection District board on the 14th and the authority’s board on the 28th, all open to the public. Randy Mirowski has been interim fire chief since April 6, 2026, while the authority recruits a permanent chief; the finalists met the public at the Pulliam Community Building on September 14.

Living here

Summer is the water and the sculpture. Boyd Lake State Park is 2,082 acres around 1,700 surface acres of water, open 5 am to 10 pm, with a daily vehicle pass of $10 to $12 for Colorado plates and $15 to $17 for others; low water has closed the lake to boating for the rest of 2026 and kept the marina shut all season, but kayaks, paddleboards and swimmers are still allowed. On the second weekend of August the Loveland High Plains Arts Council’s Sculpture in the Park show and sale fills Benson Sculpture Garden; the rest of the year the garden at 2908 Aspen Drive is free, with 188 sculptures on 10 acres. Fall and winter bring hockey: the Colorado Eagles play at Blue Arena in The Ranch, off I-25. Winter is the Sweetheart City’s Valentine Re-mailing Program, running since 1947: valentines sent to Loveland go back out hand-stamped with a cachet and verse, new each year, and a special postmark, on average more than 160,000 cards from across the United States and more than 110 countries, while paid messages on wooden hearts line the streets. Year-round there is the Rialto, which opened as a silent movie house in 1920 and now books touring musicians and comedians, and the breweries, among them Verboten on 5th Street downtown. For children, see Loveland with kids. What is on this week is on the events page.