Austin?
 

My current employer may have an opportunity for me in Austin Texas. I see a bunch of you are from Austin in this forum.

Those here from A-town, can you suggest some suburban areas to buy a home? We don't have kids, so schools are not a concern. I like having a little room around me, and like the countryside. Around $200K is plenty of house for just the Wife and I. A basement would be great, but I understand they are a rareity in Austin.

Thanks,
Chrisbert

At $200k-$230k, you can get a pretty good house and property if you live outside of Austin. I guess it also depends on: where your work is located and how far you want to drive. Houseing developments are poping up everywhere. As for finding a house with basement, good luck. The soil around here is mostly rock. I tried planting a tree at my backyard. After digging 12", I hit limestone!

Cool, thanks.

The office is in the area of West Lake Hills so anything northside of Austin looks good.

Chrisbert

West Lake is a nice area...and expensive. To be close to work and be affordable, you can think about South Austin area. The only developement that I can think of by name is Circle C, but there are a lot more. That area is exploding.

Looking at a map: follow Loop 1 (Mopac) >> south. It intersects Loop 360 / William Cannon / Slaughter Lane. New houses in that are are big, in the price range, and have a good size yard. Older homes in that area can be purchased at a good value with a huge yard.

Again, there are a lot of other nice neighborhoods in Austin.

In the city area I would suggest Hyde Park, Shoalwood, Travis Heights, and South First areas. All are quite expensive, but you might be able to find a small house here and there aroun 200K. They aren't exaclty suburbs, but are nice neighborhoods.

Outside of the city there are a ton of places. South tends to be a bit cheaper than north, but if you work north Milwood, Cedar Park and Round Rock seem to be popular areas. Circle C, and Steiner Ranch are also pretty nice.

Not likely to find a basment here at all. Just too much darned rock.

Oak Hill has some nice hoods, traffic might get old though

I used to commute from the Round Rock to the West Lake Hills/Barton Skyway area up until this April. Depending on the time of day I could cover that distance in 30-35 minutes under optimum conditions. That usually meant leaving Round Rock by 7:00 AM and leaving work at 4:30 PM. The reality of the situation is that if you hit the normal peak travel times you're looking at a 45 minute to an hour commute over about a 15-20 mile route.

After five years of making that drive I opted for a commute of about half that distance and I'm now driving 30 minutes in rush hour traffic.

An area that hasn't been mentioned that is more sub-urban and close to Lake Travis is Lakeway. That'll get you out much closer to the hills and excellent twisties. Unfortunately you'll also get a nice sized commute.

Thanks for all the replies and suggestions. If I end up moving out there, I'll have to look you up.

Chrisbert

You might also check for "back roads" into where you would be working. Austin is full of alternative routes. To be honest, I suggest getting an Apt. someplace for 6 months while checking out the area. My employer put me up in "company housing" (furnished apt) for a month when I moved here 5 years ago. It was a big help in getting a feel for the different areas.

I ended up in Cedar Park...8 mile commute is 20 minutes on average, but getting better due to expansion work on 183.

that new stretch of 183 is fun, watch out for the poh-poh though (police) I've been here 25 years and watched this place grow, defintely a great place to live if you love music and can tolerate the "college town" atmosphere (i,e; the enviro's and lefties everywhere lol)

Nothing wrong with UT :) I'm one of those college towners, from Dallas.

I live near Athens GA now (UGA) so the college town thing is OK.

Well, I got some very sad news yesterday. The manager that was putting together the program that I was a candidate for was killed in a car crash on Sunday evening in Austin. I am devestated as he was my friend and coworker.

- Chrisbert