Mark Weston

Mark Weston is a consulting appraiser. He retired as Colorado’s first Director of the Division of Conservation in September 2019 and continues to teach (the University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law’s Trying Times seminar, as well as webinars, workshops, and seminars for the Land Trust Alliance) and consult. Weston was elected to the Land Trust Accreditation Commission in 2021. Prior to joining state government in 2016, he practiced more than 30 years as an independent real estate appraiser, with special interest in valuation of conservation easements encumbering private land. Mark helped develop and instructed the initial five-day conservation easement valuation seminar developed by the American Society of Farm Mangers and Rural Appraisers, the American Society of Appraisers and the Appraisal Institute, and was an Appraisal Qualifications Board Certified USPAP Instructor, 2004-2020. Mark co-authored the Land Trust Alliance’s “Tax Benefits & Appraisals of Conservation Projects,” 2007. He is a contributing author of the “Water Rights Handbook for Colorado Conservation Professionals,” Colorado Water Trust, 2011, and “Appraising Easements: Guidelines for Valuation of Land Conservation and Historic Preservation Easements,” 3rd ed., Land Trust Alliance & National Trust for Historic Preservation, 1999. Mark served two terms on the Colorado Board of Real Estate Appraisers (1999 - 2005), the Colorado Conservation Easement Oversight Commission (2008 – 2011), the Cherry Creek Basin Water Quality Authority (2001 - 2008) and was an early board member and president of the Colorado Coalition of Land Trusts.