While the Austin housing market continues to shatter price records, a new study shows it’s the best U.S. market for growth and stability.

The study, published by personal finance website SmartAsset, places Austin at No. 1 among 400 metro areas for housing growth and stability. That’s up from the No. 2 spot last year.

The study notes that Austin-area home prices soared 368 percent from 1997 through the end of 2021. That was the biggest spike among all of the metro areas examined in the study. Meanwhile, it estimates there’s a zero percent chance that an Austin-area home would suffer a 5 percent drop in value within 10 years of being purchased. 

In February, the median price of a home in the Austin metro area came within $5 of $500,000,…

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When Lakeway resident Katie Bigus and her husband started looking for a home near his job on Bee Caves Road, she said they were financially prepared and could be aggressive in their bidding process.

Still, Bigus said, they lost out on their first choice after bidding about $98,000 over asking price with no contingencies and a leaseback to the sellers in the contract.

This has become the status quo, said April Womack, a Realtor with Moreland Properties, who works out of its Lake Travis location.

“It’s a really strange market,” Womack said. “I compare it to gridlock on the highway. Everyone is trying to get somewhere, but traffic just won’t move.”She said while sellers love the equity rising home values have added to their homes, they would pay more to…

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Why Austin?

CrowdStreet evaluated multiple data points from leading industry sources to compile its list of the 20 best markets for real estate investors. These markets are in the best position to benefit from the continued strength in real estate. They should deliver above-average rent growth, strong absorption rates, recovering job growth, and strong median household income growth. These factors should drive continued real estate price appreciation in 2022 across these markets.

Austin led the way because it continues to benefit from strong population and job growth. That's because companies -- especially in the technology sector -- continue to relocate and expand in the city. For example, e-commerce behemoth Amazon recently announced plans to…

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Any hopes of ever buying an “affordable” house in the city of Austin are quickly fading, especially for first-time homebuyers.

In January 2022, the median sale price of a home within the city limits climbed to $550,000, up 20.9 percent from the same time a year earlier, according to the Austin Board of Realtors. Even the median sale price for the entire Austin metro area is increasingly out of reach for many first-time homebuyers — $476,000 in January 2022, up 30.4 percent from a year earlier.

However, some Austin suburbs enable first-time buyers to get more bang for the buck. While they might be a fair distance from Austin itself, a number of suburbs offer home prices at least $100,000 below the region’s median price.

In alphabetical order,…

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Just a few months after sales launched, potential buyers have reserved more than half of the luxury Four Seasons-branded residences planned for a high-profile cliff overlooking Lake Austin.

The sales pace for the units is another sign of the Austin region's continued rising real estate market, including the high-end segment, housing industry experts say.

The 179 residences in the Four Seasons project are due to break ground next year. Prices start at $4.1 million.

Reservations began in late September, and hit the half-way mark in just four months, said Eric Moreland, broker associate with Moreland Properties who is handling sales.

Officially named Four Seasons Private Residences Lake Austin, the condominium project will be located on…

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