Choosing an Austin 'Burb (Waco, Spring: house, YMCA, high school)

[CptnRn]

Originally Posted by 10scoachrick

Commuting from Leander to Westlake/360? C'mon.

Yeah, I don't know why they are looking at such far away suburbs. I'd be looking for housing west of Looop 360 in the Bee Cave / Cuernavaca Road areas and on out to Bee Caves.

[Antny12]

Leander is not far out by any means- i work out in lakeway and bee caves and commute from Leander..if you leave before 7am you're fine. Easy. I can be in Austin in 5 minutes (north Austin). I have no reason to go downtown often enough- and have no interest in living in city proper personally. I didn't read the west lake job part however as I said if you leave before 7 that's really not that far of a drive. And as with lakeway, bee caves and the Steiner area it's extremely scenic and beautiful- yet unbelievablely sterile feeling. And the traffic out there is insane- everyone takes the very few roads that lead into town- and they are all backed up, always.

[whatthehey]

Thanks everyone for the straight shooting advice, I appreciate it.

I still don't understand the face palm on the Leander to Westlake commute. I know you're the local experts so I obvs defer, but it seems like it takes just as long (if not longer) to get from the west vs. coming down from the north on the tollway. Even though the distance is more, the time is the same. It's probably obvious that I'm an idiot on the local area. I have the flexibility to come in to the office after traffic dies down, or before it starts up, and it seems that this is what most people in our office are doing for this reason, so I did figure that looking in areas that give us what we want, but might be further away, make more sense.

And sure, Westlake Hills is clearly ideal from a location perspective, but it is so insanely expensive that I just can't see it happening unless I seriously want to lower my expectations on the actual dwelling. Don't get me wrong - it is from what I can tell, a beautiful area, but it just doesn't seem realistic for us price wise. We're trying to reduce our cost of living, and avoid a mortgage. And the idea of buying an older home that needs tons of updating is just not something we want to do.

On the acreage thing, upon further discussions, we agreed that an acre is enough. We are not looking for a farm; we know nothing about chickens.

Leander does look to be the place where we are really honing in because it does offer the home we want, the space we want, and generally allows us to be in decent proximity to convenience. Georgetown scares me just a bit, but I do like the community.

UGH. My head is going to explode

[Kion]

What "tollway" are you talking about? 183A? That ends well north of where you would need it to.

That said. I'd start with the area around Volente and work outwards. It's going to be a hike to the airport, but hits almost everything else.

[riaelise]

Uh, what is so "scary" about Georgetown?

183A ends in North Austin, and after that it is MoPac. I've seen traffic on MoPac well after 9 am. You might want to see where the people in your office live. Many people I know that work South tend to live in SW Austin or Dripping/Driftwood if they want acreage. I'm all for living where you're happy, commute be damned. I live in Round Rock and work downtown. But if my job relo'd to South of the river, I guarantee you I wouldn't be looking at houses so far north.

[SuziPQ]

I have lived in the Austin area for over 20 years. During that time I've lived in Northwest Austin, Zilker and South Austin with the majority of my career working in the Westlake area. Nine years ago, my husband and I moved to 2 heavily wooded acres off of 290 between Oak Hill & Dripping Spings and absolutely love it. There are a number of subdivisions in this area with 1 acre+ lots. My commute to the heart of West Lake Hills is about 30 minutes. Contrast that to my husband's commute to north of the Domain at 1 1/2 hours - each way - and that's with either Mopac or 620. My airport commute is also only about 30 minutes. When you get to our house, it is a quiet and peaceful country life, but we are closer to many things downtown and to the airport than my friends who live in Cedar Park/Round Rock. Also, if you are looking for wooded hills those are south and southwest. Georgetown/Leander are flat as a pancake. I would recommend staying south of Lake Austin for what you want.

[TexasHorseLady]

Okay, I somehow missed the Westlake 360 reference. While Georgetown wouldn't be that far (depending on what route you take - I used to drive to visit my daughter in Apache Shores regularly from about 15 minutes north of Georgetown and it regularly took me an hour but I took the "back way") and that's way past Westlake Drive/360. So figure about 30-40 minutes if you're not driving during rush hour.

Crystal Falls Parkway in Leander comes in on Mapquest at 25 minutes to that intersection.

[whatthehey]

Yeah, the office is on Bridge Point Pkwy, so it's 183 to the 360 loop exit. Unless I'm doing something wrong, I don't have to get on MoPac to get to the office. IDK if that makes a difference on the face palm

A couple people in the office live in Dripping Springs (290 and 12) and are really recommending it hard. I saw a few houses I really liked there, but they also say that it can take 60-90m to get to the office. That's why I was like, well then, same difference, and looked a bit north where it seemed like there was just more stuff around. Plus my sister lives in Ft. Worth and thought that might make it easier for us to meet in Waco (That was a joke. But my sister does really live in Ft. Worth).

I only know 2 other people in Austin. One lives in Allandale which I like by my husband refuses, and one lives in Buda on major acreage, but he works from home and likes to shoot snakes and stuff....

[whatthehey]

Originally Posted by SuziPQ

I have lived in the Austin area for over 20 years. During that time I've lived in Northwest Austin, Zilker and South Austin with the majority of my career working in the Westlake area. Nine years ago, my husband and I moved to 2 heavily wooded acres off of 290 between Oak Hill & Dripping Spings and absolutely love it. There are a number of subdivisions in this area with 1 acre+ lots. My commute to the heart of West Lake Hills is about 30 minutes. Contrast that to my husband's commute to north of the Domain at 1 1/2 hours - each way - and that's with either Mopac or 620. My airport commute is also only about 30 minutes. When you get to our house, it is a quiet and peaceful country life, but we are closer to many things downtown and to the airport than my friends who live in Cedar Park/Round Rock. Also, if you are looking for wooded hills those are south and southwest. Georgetown/Leander are flat as a pancake. I would recommend staying south of Lake Austin for what you want.

@SuziPQ, thanks! This is really exactly what we were looking for. It's been hard to reconcile our household wish lists Being from Chicago, my husband was really looking for some space, where I didn't want to sacrifice convenience. I know I have to re-think my lifestyle a bit, but if we could find a compromise that gave us each a little of what we wanted, that would be totally ideal. I'll start re-investigating Dripping Springs, which is actually where I began when this whole thing started! HA.

[TexasHorseLady]

You'll find that there are people in Austin who live south and think anything north is the other side of the moon and vice versa, because you have to cross the river. And that is an issue, but there's ways and ways around that one if you've lived here long enough to see all the "regular ways" being built and remember the old ones that aren't used as much. And even the ways most use aren't as bad as I keep hearing on here, in my experience, outside of rush hour. (I started timing myself after hearing such discussions and being involved in them on here, and watching the speed of my car when on Mopac, etc., just to confirm what I thought I'd been experiencing.)

Of course, I'm native Texan and have been known to drive to Houston from Austin and back for a day of lunch and shopping, so I might not be the best example!