What are some of the not-perfect areas of Austin? (Taylor: real estate, HOA fees)

[sliverbox]

My Wife and I do not have kids nor want them. As a result, we do not care if an area is squeaky-clean, with perfect schools, and so on. If anything we would like to be in an older, but not necessarily historically interesting-aka expensive- area. We sort of looked around South Austin and parts of it looked right up our alley in regards to prices and from what I heard from locals, lower in taxes as well. If anything we would like to avoid areas that are family magnets to avoid the problems of higher taxes and escalating property values.

[TexasHorseLady]

Well, interestingly, given your last comment, I'd say that some of the areas with the highest escalating property values are those that are NOT areas that draw families (SoCo, downtown, as examples of areas that tend to draw more young folks without kids). Granted, the HOA neighborhoods tend to draw families and have the HOA fees on top of the "regular" property taxes, but that's not quite the same thing.

That being said, you're looking in the right direction looking south. Look in the Oltorf/Congress/South Lamar area, around St. Edwards as well.

[sliverbox]

It was nuts how drastic the prices were. I was only there a week, but it seemed that the hills closer to the river with old houses were really expensive. But just down the other side the prices slid back down to a lot cheaper. We met a couple in a bar. They had a house in South Austin they had paid 120k for a year earlier. We saw a lot of signs in South Austin saying " Save our community!" which basically meant that they didn't like the folks with money moving in at all.

[mark311]

I have a friend that was in the same situation and ended up buying a place in Delwood. (78723) He lived there for a couple years and never had any problems. However, like THL states, the types of neighborhoods that you are looking at are prime for gentrification and could easily be the biggest gainers in home values.

[sliverbox]

I'd ideally like something like this even though I think the price is just a bit north of what I'm willing to pay given the taxes: Beautiful Craftsman Home - Totally Renovated! (http://austin.craigslist.org/reo/1339292774.html - broken link)

Realistically, I think I'd probably wind up in something like this: $89,800 3BR/2BA Single Family House (http://austin.craigslist.org/reb/1388705038.html - broken link) which means yes- something akin to a cookie-cutter.

Actually, I'm fine with 60's and 70's ranchers or something like that. Unfortunately it just seems that since so many newer cities build nothing but cookie-cutter developments, it makes the more interesting areas very expensive.

[TexasHorseLady]

Well, if you're interested in living in Taylor, you could pick up a home like that first one (where it is) for considerably less than that and fix it up so that it's what you want. If you're into that kind of thing (fixing up houses, that is). Taylor's taxes aren't going to be so high, and it's not going to gentrify as quickly (though it is going through that process slowly now)

[mark311]

Originally Posted by sliverbox

Realistically, I think I'd probably wind up in something like this: $89,800 3BR/2BA Single Family House (http://austin.craigslist.org/reb/1388705038.html - broken link) which means yes- something akin to a cookie-cutter.

That house is in Elgin, not Austin. You should use Austin Real Estate | AustinHomeSearch | Austin Realtors | Austin TX Real Estate for your searches.