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Unless one is actually in the market for a $6 million home, it's difficult to wrangle an invitation to tour one of the Yampa Valley's showcase properties.

Residents and visitors have a chance Aug. 1 to glimpse how the other half lives while making a difference for a range of local nonprofit organizations. They also can make notes about custom details that could be incorporated into the remodel of a more modest Steamboat home.

The first day of August marks the Steamboat Springs Parade of Homes hosted by Colorado Group Realty. The event benefits the realty firm's charitable foundation.

"People come with cameras and take notes," Colorado Group's Laurie Peter said. "Many of the builders will be there - some of these finishes you could incorporate into your own residence and add some luxury."

In addition to general contractors, subcontractors such as the designers and sound engineers who worked on the homes are invited to discuss the finer details of each property.

Tickets are $20 and are available in advance at the Colorado Group Realty office, 509 Lincoln Ave., as well as at Saturday's Mainstreet Farmers Market and in any of the homes on the day of the event. It's a self-guided tour with detailed programs (serving as the ticket) and maps provided. All of the proceeds of the event go to the foundation.

Colorado Group's Charitable Trust has raised more than $40,000 in grants made available to more than 25 community organizations, from Born Free Wildlife Rehabilitation to Emerald City Opera and the Community Agriculture Alliance.

Tread of Pioneers Museum Director Candice Lombardo said her organization used one of the grants to help it digitize and store interviews with historic figures from 300 audio cassette tapes made by local high school students working for Three Wire Winter magazine.

The interviews from the 1970s captured the first-person stories of Yampa Valley pioneers including Alma Baer, Elmer Brooks, Farrington Carpenter, Clay Monson, Portia Mansfield and Wayne Light.

In its first two years, the Parade of Homes typically did not feature homes listed for sale. That's not the case this year, but the emphasis remains not on actively marketing the homes, but on opening the homes up to the public to serve local causes, Peter said.

"This event was started with the sole purpose of allowing the public to get a chance to see very special homes, which they would no usually be able to see while raising money for the charity," she said.

Dave Hartley, a broker/owner at Colorado Group, said the only visible evidence of marketing materials at the home at 32545 McKinnis Creek Road will be the "for sale" sign out front.

The owner of the home may not be present Aug. 1, but he may be keeping an eye on the tour anyway. Hartley said the property was designed as a second home and includes a Total Control Access system by Control 4 that includes discreetly placed video cameras. They allow the owner, in Chicago, for example, to order grocery deliveries and then watch on a computer screen as the delivery person shows up. When he or she arrives in the driveway, the homeowner can remotely open the garage door, watch the delivery person put things away in the pantry and the close the garage door.

Colorado Group broker/owner Kris McGee, who lives in the home at 39745 Deerfoot Ave. perched above downtown Steamboat, will give Parade of Homes visitors a view of the valley they've never seen before.

"The view is over the Charles Atwood Ranch and across Perry Mansfield to Buffalo Pass," McGee said. "You can't see it unless you come up here."