Nice rental homes near Ft Sam Houston? (San Antonio, Schertz: real estate, crime rate)

[66Fbound]

I'm moving my family to San Antonio this month and I'm looking for a 4 bedroom rental for roughly $1200-1300/month and no more than a 15-20 minute commute to Ft Sam Houston. We prefer new-ish quality construction. I'd like a place where we can take our kids to a community park and/or pool with zero, absolutely zero, worry about lowlifes, tweakers, thug middle schoolers with chips on their shoulders, and so on. We don't need a million dollar home, but we do want a place where we could take the country club relatives without getting their panties in a bunch.

Our kids are not school age so that's not important to us at this time. Traditional neighborhood or gated community is unimportant. Convenient access to Costco would be nice.

I have visited San Antonio twice but didn't see too much of the neighborhoods except for what is between the airport and Ft Sam. I loved Olmos Park, Alamo Heights and Terrell Hills, of course, but rentals are out of our price range.

A lot of rental listings with our criteria are showing up either in the Converse area or way out west just outside of the 1604. People seem to have mixed opinions of Converse on this board, and west of the 1604 is too far to commute.

I don't see much of what we're looking for on the south side.

Kirby has places in our price range but it looks a little run down.

Schertz and Cibolo come recommended from others at Ft Sam, with the caveat that traffic can be a nightmare. Exactly how bad is this nightmare? Looking at traffic right now on google maps it looks like gridlock going out toward Schertz.

If we go north side, it looks like 1604/281 traffic can be a mess too. We drove around Stone Oak and it looked okay, but I'm worried that it would be too far to drive.

Kids are crying, I'll check in later.

[L210]

One thing about Converse, it has an extremely low murder rate. There have been more people murdered in the Stone Oak area than in Converse. Actually, I think there has only been one murder in Converse in the past 10 years. Converse's crime rate is lower than the national and Texas average. Not that I'm saying Stone Oak isn't safe because it is, but people exaggerate about any neighborhood in the eastern part of Bexar County.

Moderator cut: link removed, linking to competitor sites is not allowed

If you want, send me a DM and I'll give you a link to a real estate website where you can search for houses. I've been looking for a place to rent and talked to two real estate agents. All they did was search a database that is accessible to the public, but hard to find.

[66Fbound]

Thanks for your reply; DM sent.

Are there any areas of Converse that are better than others? Can you comment on the traffic situation?

[smuboy86]

You really are going to up your budget to at least 1500 a month for a 4 bedroom if you want anything decent in an ok neighborhood. If you must only spend a max of 1300, it looks like there is one home in Royal Ridge for that. If you could do 1500 it looks like 2 homes in Northwood start at that. Both areas are an easy commute to Ft. Sam.

[L210]

According to Google Maps, a trip from Converse to Fort Sam would put you over 20 min. There are closer areas you can move to if you can find something in your price range. In your price range ($1,000+), the areas of Converse you would move to would be on the nicer side. I found a place in 78216 that would put you under 20 min. from Fort Sam. When you search, some close zip codes would be 78217, 78216, 78209, 78234, 78208, 78239, 78218, 78212, and possibly 78233. Try to avoid a place where you have to use IH-35 or 281 near 1604 if you want to avoid heavy traffic. 78239, 78216, and 78212 are hit or miss; 78218 is mostly sketchy but Oakwell Farms is in the zip code and is very nice; 78209 is sketchy south of Alamo Heights; and 78217 is sketchy around Perrin Beitel south of Wurzbach Pkwy. Some other zip codes would be 78215, 78202, 78205, 78203, 78219, and 78244; but I'm not as familiar with those. 78247 is a nice zip code and would put you around 23 min. away.

I also found a few places fitting your criteria in Northern Hills which is a nice subdivision, but it would put you a little over 20 min. away from Fort Sam. You could actually avoid taking any highways from that area. While the subdivision is nice, the stores around there might have some sketchy characters. In your price range for a 4-bedroom house, your options are pretty limited if you want to completely avoid the sight of thugs, homeless people, rowdy middle-schoolers, etc.

[66Fbound]

Thanks again for your replies. We're considering upping our maximum rent, but in the meantime will look for new listings until we arrive later this month. A couple of owners may be willing to decrease the rent if direct deposit arrangements are made..

[TXStrat]

It is well over a 20 minute commute from Ft. Sam to anywhere in the Cibolo, Shertz, Universal City area. Depending on your work schedule, it could be easily double the 15-20 minute commute. Both I-35 and Hwy 78 are very hectic in the morning and evening commute times. I would say that the Olmos Park, Terrell Hills, and Alamo Heights areas would be challenge to find rentals in your price range, additionally, there isn't much new construction in any of these neighborhoods. These are all older, established neighborhoods. The Stone Oak area north of 1604 on 281 has loads of new construction, but it would be pushing the 15-20 minute commute time requirement. If you have some flexibility in your work schedule, you could adjust to miss peak traffic times. Leave around 6am in the morning and between 3:30-4pm in the evening.

The other challenge will be gate traffic on Ft. Sam. There is a load of construction going on at the minute. The 2005 BRAC moves impacted Ft. Sam quite heavily, and the additional traffic load is evident. There is work ongoing to widen the main gate on I-35, and improve the gate on Binz-Engleman Rd. The Binz-Engleman gate had issues with flooding in heavy rains on a low water crossing. The improved route will be elevated to avoid the problem area. The widened main gate will be 4 lanes in and 2 lanes out, a vast improve from it's current state. Construction on the main gate (Walters St.) was scheduled for completion this month, but looks more like April-May time frame.

[CasieNakamura]

If you can find a place off of 281 that's further south than 1604, the traffic is not too bad, and I think you could make it to Ft. Sam in around 20 minutes, especially since the 401 and 281 interchange has alleviated a lot of the congestion in that area.

Definitely agree w/ the zipcodes posted above. My husband and I live in 78247, and I think in the mornings we could probably get to Ft. Sam in around 20/25 minutes. I also think 78232 (281 and Brookhollow area) would work, as long as you find a route from your home directly onto 281.

Good luck!

[austindoxie1972]

You may need to up your rent and live in one of the closer in neighborhoods (Alamo Heights, Terrell Hills). Though finding a four bedroom might be hard. Don't know this for a fact, but I have heard that it is hard to find rentals in Stone Oak? I thought that many HOAs do not allow rentals? I could be wrong.

I also woudn't wait for people to lower their rent. When looking at properties in SA, I would always run into owners with cash who didn't care. The husband had a military pension and gov't retirement, plus the wife had a gov't retirement. These are the same people who say that SA is cheap, cheap, cheap. And it is...if you have 3 salaries coming in.

[Chaka]

Is a 4 bedroom home an absolute requirement?

There just aren't that many 4 bedroom homes to start with (though a 3+ den may be more common), and certainly not in that price range, and certainly not in the areas you want to be for new construction.

You might need to reconsider your requirements to stay within your budget.