When you think of luxury homes, what comes to mind – Austin, Texas? Probably not. But guess what? They absolutely do exist. Better yet, there are some areas of stunningly amazing luxury homes in the Austin area.
There are several reasons that Austin has a luxury real estate market. Unlike the image many people have of Texas in general, Austin is incredibly different. The photo below will illustrate that point.
See what I mean? This photo looks out over luxury homes by Lake Travis in Lakeway. This is a great place to take in some of the dramatic Hill Country.
So what else drives the luxury home market in Austin? The University of Texas, the Texas state government and lots of high tech. Some of the employers in the Austin area with highly paid executives include Advanced Micro Devices, IBM, Motorloa, National Instruments, Dell Computers, Freescale, Cisco, Trilogy, Samsung… The list goes on and on.
What is a luxury home?
Luxury means different things to different people, but most people equate luxury real estate with a relatively high dollar figure. When I think of luxury real estate in Austin, most local real estate agents think of homes priced at over $750,000. What most would think of as luxury homes in Austin will be in the hills or on the lakes. In the Austin area we have Lady Bird Lake (formerly Town Lake), Lake Austin and Lake Travis. The first two are long and narrow portions of the Colorado River as it flows from one dam to the next through Austin. Homes on these lakes tend to get very expensive due to their proximity to the downtown area. Lake Travis is a bit farther out, but there are many newer, large luxury homes on Lake Travis.
Austin Luxury Subdivisions
As far as communities and subdivisions go, there are many to talk about. They include the city of West Lake Hills, which is close to downtown Austin and has many dramatic views of downtown Austin. There are the subdivisions of Barton Creek and Davenport Ranch, which are also fairly close to the downtown Austin area. Rob Roy, Seven Oaks and Spanish Oaks are just a bit farther out. Out on or near Lake Travis are the exclusive gated communities of Vineyard Bay, Arbolago and Costa Bella. The south shore of Lake Travis from Lakeway to the west is a wonderful place to own luxury waterfront real estate. Lake Travis waterfront communities include Lakeway, Angel Bay, the Coves on Lake Travis, Lakecliff and Barton Creek Lakeside on the south shore and Lago Vista on the north shore. Each of these neighborhoods has something different to offer. Of course there are more areas to talk about, but these are very representative of the Austin luxury real estate market. If you don't mind being a little farther out, Cimarron Hills in Georgetown is a very nice golf community.
The above photo looks across from Vineyard Bay to Costa Bella.
Many thanks to Jarrod Frenzel of The Woodlands Real Estate for proofreading this page.
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