Depends what you determine as a decent area. You should be able to be reasonably close to downtown/RiNo for ~$1500 though and could probably do fine even cheaper off of Federal or further south.

Yeah this is overpaying just for location. I bought a new-build townhome in the Denver metro this year and have 3br/3ba mortgage for under $2k. Even in Denver proper rent can be found under that pretty easily, it may just not be in a hip area.