Visiting Austin (Round Rock, Cedar Park, Pflugerville: real estate, high crime, houses)

[Marianna]

I am visiting Austin in September with my boyfriend. We're interested in moving there so we want to check out the area. I would like to know which neighborhoods, in and around Austin, are good places to live so I can map out where to go on my trip. Please help!! Thanks.

[McJ]

That's a hard question to answer without knowing what you want. What specifically are you looking for in a neighborhood? How close do you want to be to downtown? What is your price range? Where do you think you will be working/is commuting a issue? Are you looking for country living, urban living, family living, etc.
I'll help if I can, I've been here two yrs in the SW area and love it.

[Austinitegirl]

Hi there. Here's what I posted for someone else considering Austin:

I've lived in different parts of the country (DC, midwest, south, etc.) and Austin is one of my favorite places BY FAR.
Moderator cut: off-topic for this post
As far as where to live in Austin - that's really a matter of opinion. I personally live in Round Rock (a northern suburb of Austin) and I absolutely love it. It's clean, nice, family-friendly, minimal crime and convenient to lots of major employers and retailers (without looking over-commercialized). There are a lot of other nice suburbs - Pflugerville (Round Rock's less affluent neighbor - but still nice and family-friendly), Cedar Park (very nice and up-and-coming area) - Leander (a little far for me, but you can buy a lotta house out there for not much money and it's also up-and-coming) - Manor (rural suburb with a lot of growth) - Kyle and Buda (also very rural and a little far south for me, but some people really like it there).

If you want to live in Austin proper - expect to get raped on property costs. The nicer neighborhoods (Allandale, Hyde Park, Tarrytown, northwest Austin) have 60 year-old, 900 sq. ft. homes going for ~ $450,000. No joke. It's very fashionable to live in one of those old 1930's tract homes and remodel it - which is why so many people live in the suburbs. There are many more moderately priced neighborhoods in Austin - but expect to get what you pay for. In other words - if it costs you less than $200K - it will LOOK like it costs you less than $50K - or it will be in a crappy neighborhood or in a crappy school zone or in an area with high crime.

Thankfully - there really aren't any scary parts of Austin (the native Austinites would disagree with me, but I've lived in some big cities with scary parts that I wouldn't drive through in the day time - Austin doesn't have ANY areas like that). But the "less desirable" neighborhoods are generally going to be east of I35 (or close to I35) between William Cannon and Parmer Lane. Generally speaking - the farther north and west you go of the city's center - the better the neighborhoods (and the higher the prices).

I would steer clear of the downtown area (unless you're a millionaire) and I would avoid the Parmer Lane area east of MoPac (Loop 1) because of the traffic congestion.

I have some friends that live in South Austin and they are pretty convinced it's Nirvana - around the South Congress (which hip cool Austinites call "SoCo") area. I think there's some nice stuff in south Austin around Brodie Lane and I know there's a SWEET neighborhood called Circle C Ranch in southwest Austin which I'M pretty sure is Nirvana. And I know there are some new housing developments popping up near the old Mueller Airport site (near Airport and I35 - which would be my only exception to the rule about avoiding the I35 area south of Parmer Lane).

I've lived here for 8 years and I love it more every year. I hope that helps!!

[Marianna]

Being from New York, I would love to live in a trendy type of neighborhood. But honestly, all I really need is a safe, pretty, and vibrant area. I would like to be within 15 minutes of downtown....with something in the range of about $250,000-$300,000. Suburbs are okay with me too! I am just so excited to see what Austin is like. If you can give me a list of restaurants and/or shops to visit while I am scoping out the area in September that would be great too. Thanks for your help!

Originally Posted by McJ

That's a hard question to answer without knowing what you want. What specifically are you looking for in a neighborhood? How close do you want to be to downtown? What is your price range? Where do you think you will be working/is commuting a issue? Are you looking for country living, urban living, family living, etc.
I'll help if I can, I've been here two yrs in the SW area and love it.

[Jazzedforhim]

Austinitegirl: Thank you so much for posting this information!!! We are coming out next week to look at some homes, this will be valuable information for sure!

Marianna: I live in Northern California and have been house hunting online for a while now. From what I've seen you can get a heck of a lot of house for $250k-$300k! Good luck on your search. Sorry I can't be of any help on the shops to visit...unless we run across some great finds next week in which case I'll post them. Not sure though, we have two kids in tow so it's a different trip for us I'm sure. LOL

Teri

[McJ]

Marianna~
Austinitegirl gave you some good info on areas. I'll just add a couple of SW areas since that is where I'm at:
Circle C-(although very suburban, it is close to a major freeway, about 10-15mins from downtown, they have beautiful walking areas, and a nice high end grocery store.
Oak Hill - about 10 mins from downtown, right by the "Y" so you are super close to freeways and shopping and it's older but not to old if you know what I mean.
There are also new subdivisions, a huge mall and large box shopping popping up all over the place out here, so you definately have choices.
As far as trendy near hip shopping, I think So. Congress would be your best bet although the pricing may be above what you are looking for. It cost a lot to live in small old home here.

Good luck. Feel free to PM me if you have any more questions.

[Austin97]

Originally Posted by Marianna

I am visiting Austin in September with my boyfriend. We're interested in moving there so we want to check out the area. I would like to know which neighborhoods, in and around Austin, are good places to live so I can map out where to go on my trip. Please help!! Thanks.

Since austinite girl posted her summary of austin

I found this group and it looked to be fun. I live in austin and thought I would post some of the resources that I use to find real estate:

google maps in hybrid mode gives you an idea of what the houses look like.

Austinhomesearch.com Home Page - this is the main website with all of the mls listings. This lets you search for houses by various criteria

Moderator cut: realtor site

Travis CAD Main - This is the tax appraisal district. Every property is listed along with the tax value. Note that the tax value is always lower than the real value. Sometimes by a little, sometimes by a lot. Every address has an online plat so you can see the exact layout of the land itself

You can also look up agricultural exemptions. If you get a large lot and have some farm animals (like goats) you can pay next to nothing in taxes)

Generally speaking:

Far North austin - yuppies, high tech. Higher end shopping like tiffany and co. neimans etc just opened up in the domain (north of 183,west of mopac, east of 620, south of parmer)


North austin - laid back, cheap, lots of strip malls, lower income but will be gentrified soon (east of mopac, west of i35, south of 183, north of ~45th street)

Central austin - laid back, expensive, small houses, walking distance to a lot of traditional austin places. Like restaurants in houses. (south of 45, east of mopac, west of i35, north of 26th)

Campus -lots of students (same as central but north of 15th south of 26th or so)

downtown - trendy, expensive, great nightlife (north of 1st street, south of 15th, west of i35, east of lamar)

garden district, similar to central austin (same as downtown but west of lamar, east of mopac)

West austin - Newer developments, larger properties, lots of hills and protected land (west of 360, north of 71, south of 183, east of 620)

Lake - lake life, laid back, not a lot of employers (along the lake)

soco (south congress) - close in is now trendy in a grunge/slacker way, but getting very expensive. (south of the river - riverside drive, north of oltorf)

east - getting gentrified, used to find great deals there, but because it is walking distance to downtown it is rapidly getting expensive. Can still find good deals though as it has a high hispanic concentration (east of i35, parallel to downtown)

airport - wide open very flat spaces large properties