8 ms·

Welcome to the Lone Star State! Cheap real estate and friendly folks. And BBQ, metric tons of BBQ...

by nthomas 7y ago

driverdan 7y ago
Westlake does not have cheap real estate.
- smohnot 7y ago
  Relative to Dallas, yes - relative to SF it's quite a bit cheaper. Westlake's median price per square foot is $392, SF is $1068. The surroundings of SF don't get much cheaper. Dallas is $204/sf. https://www.zillow.com/westlake-tx/home-values/ https://www.zillow.com/westlake-tx/home-values/ https://www.zillow.com/san-francisco-ca/home-values/ https://www.zillow.com/san-francisco-ca/home-values/ https://www.zillow.com/dallas-tx/home-values/ https://www.zillow.com/dallas-tx/home-values/
  - shuckles 7y ago
    I think the appropriate measure is median sales price, not price per square foot. Cities show that most people can consume much smaller homes than the median new construction in America, but small homes isn’t as much of an option in this part of Texas.
- hindsightbias 7y ago
  And no Prop 13. Takes 1 or 2 reassessments before the screeching begins.
  - ummonk 7y ago
    Unless you're a retiree, the lack of a state income tax makes up for it. Texas' policies are pro-worker and anti-landowner.
- sdnlafkjh34rw 7y ago
  Austin is the least affordable of the Texas metros. The affordable ones are Houston, San Antonio, and Dallas/Fort Worth (basically any major metro outside of Austin).
CydeWeys 7y ago
And traffic out the wazoo, and few good alternatives to driving.
- sdnlafkjh34rw 7y ago
  The traffic in Texas is significantly better than SF and LA. My parents live in a suburb that is 25 miles from the Houston and it takes 45 minutes to get to downtown during commute hours. My girlfriend has an equivalent commute in the Bay which takes around 75-90 minutes during commute hours. The public transit is terrible in Texas so I expect it will be worse than the Bay in a decade or two if they refuse to build up transit, but for now it's a lot better. Texas has a lot more space so they've addressed traffic issues by building much wider highways and also multiple rings of highways. Obviously that's an unsustainable solution in the long term but for the time being, my Texas friends have way better commutes than what I see my co-workers deal with in the bay. We shouldn't really be criticizing other states when California is definitely not the model for transit and traffic either. LA is a nightmare and SF is getting close to one as more and more tech companies move away from transit centers and force employees to drive.
  - CydeWeys 7y ago
    Texas is significantly worse than SF for anyone who doesn't have a car. There aren't good alternatives to driving to get around there. The traffic principally affects you if you drive, hence why Texas is often worse even now than SF.
    - sdnlafkjh34rw 7y ago
      In Texas, you are forced to drive because there isn't public transit. In California, you are forced to drive because you have to live far away from transit centers in order to find affordable housing. Regardless if you look at commuter data, it's pretty obvious that the Bay Area & LA commuters are significantly higher than Texas metros. We have higher median, average, and extremes in commute times: https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/08/22/bay-area-traffic-delays-rank-second-longest-in-nation/ https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/08/22/bay-area-traffic-dela... https://www.apartmentlist.com/rentonomics/traffic-trains-or-teleconference-the-changing-american-commute/ https://www.apartmentlist.com/rentonomics/traffic-trains-or-...
joshuaheard 7y ago
And no state income tax.
jimmaswell 7y ago
Friendly if you're the right political party and orientation, I hear.
- atlantacrackers 7y ago
  Have you ever visited? Talked to locals? You might be surprised how friendly people are IRL.
  - munin 7y ago
    I lived in Dallas and it is the only place I've lived where people would scream homophobic slurs at me in the street. I wouldn't say I'd never move back, but the situation would have to be dire for me to consider it. Definitely cut your hair if you visit.
    - bsagdiyev 7y ago
      That's not unique to Texas, just assholes. I've seen it here in San Diego while walking through Hillcrest.
      - munin 7y ago
        I dunno, 40 years of living in other places, stuff like this only happens in Texas and the South. There are definitely assholes in NY and Boston but they won't get up in my grill for "looking gay" on the street so that's pretty neat.
      - bsagdiyev 7y ago
        I concede and won't argue with personal experience. It sucks that it is still a thing anywhere, hopefully we'll get there some day.
      - scurvy 7y ago
        It happened to me in Chicago, twice in one weekend. All I did was wear a pink shirt and walk down the street. That was enough to garner homophobic slurs. I'm not gay and when I mentioned it to one of my Chicago friends, and he just shrugged his shoulders and said, "Yeah." tl;dr jerks are everywhere
aphextron 7y ago
>"Cheap real estate" And the highest property tax rate in the nation.
- toomuchtodo 7y ago
  Isn’t Prop 13 an enormous issue (with real estate owners not paying taxes on the true value of their property) in California?
  - dgoldstein0 7y ago
    Prop 13 basically just limits increases in taxes from purchase time. So it benefits existing land owners at the expense of future land owners. And it also benefits speculators - makes it cheaper to hold onto property for longer.
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
- burlesona 7y ago
  Because of the highest property tax in the nation. This is a feature, not a bug. It’s very difficult for the wealthy to hide their property. There are also a number of ways to reduce the tax rate on one’s primary residence. Combined effect of this is surprisingly progressive, closer to a wealth tax. Another effect high property taxes, is that most existing homeowners feel some pain when real estate prices soar and therefore there is a large contingent of voters who want to make sure that supply keeps up with demand so that their taxes don’t go up. By contrast, where I live (in San Francisco), the existing homeowners make out like bandits when the government policies are punitively exclusionary towards outsiders. Soaring home prices mean nothing but good for homeowners when their taxes are both very low and virtually frozen at the original purchase price by prop 13.
  - cgriswald 7y ago
    Don't forget the joy of parcel taxes, city and county sale taxes, and other ways of bleeding you out to make up for the people who aren't paying their fair share because of Prop 13; which you still have to pay even if prop 13 doesn't help you because you were born in the wrong decade.
newnewpdro 7y ago
And large industrial accidents in your back yard, hooray for no zoning laws! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Fertilizer_Company_explosion#Aftermath https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Fertilizer_Company_explos... https://www.beaumontenterprise.com/news/article/The-latest-Explosion-at-Port-Neches-plant-14866093.php https://www.beaumontenterprise.com/news/article/The-latest-E...
- stjohnswarts 7y ago
  Never been an industrial accident in California, eh?
  - newnewpdro 7y ago
    Because that's the purpose of zoning laws, to prevent accidents from occurring at all, right? :rolleyes:
- newnewpdro 7y ago
  Just remembered this illuminating USCSB coverage of the West Fertilizer explosion: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdDuHxwD5R4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdDuHxwD5R4

Welcome to the Lone Star State! Cheap real estate and friendly folks. And BBQ, metric tons of BBQ...

driverdan 7y ago

Westlake does not have cheap real estate.

smohnot 7y ago
Relative to Dallas, yes - relative to SF it's quite a bit cheaper. Westlake's median price per square foot is $392, SF is $1068. The surroundings of SF don't get much cheaper. Dallas is $204/sf. https://www.zillow.com/westlake-tx/home-values/ https://www.zillow.com/westlake-tx/home-values/ https://www.zillow.com/san-francisco-ca/home-values/ https://www.zillow.com/san-francisco-ca/home-values/ https://www.zillow.com/dallas-tx/home-values/ https://www.zillow.com/dallas-tx/home-values/
- shuckles 7y ago
  I think the appropriate measure is median sales price, not price per square foot. Cities show that most people can consume much smaller homes than the median new construction in America, but small homes isn’t as much of an option in this part of Texas.
hindsightbias 7y ago
And no Prop 13. Takes 1 or 2 reassessments before the screeching begins.
- ummonk 7y ago
  Unless you're a retiree, the lack of a state income tax makes up for it. Texas' policies are pro-worker and anti-landowner.
sdnlafkjh34rw 7y ago
Austin is the least affordable of the Texas metros. The affordable ones are Houston, San Antonio, and Dallas/Fort Worth (basically any major metro outside of Austin).

CydeWeys 7y ago

And traffic out the wazoo, and few good alternatives to driving.

sdnlafkjh34rw 7y ago
The traffic in Texas is significantly better than SF and LA. My parents live in a suburb that is 25 miles from the Houston and it takes 45 minutes to get to downtown during commute hours. My girlfriend has an equivalent commute in the Bay which takes around 75-90 minutes during commute hours. The public transit is terrible in Texas so I expect it will be worse than the Bay in a decade or two if they refuse to build up transit, but for now it's a lot better. Texas has a lot more space so they've addressed traffic issues by building much wider highways and also multiple rings of highways. Obviously that's an unsustainable solution in the long term but for the time being, my Texas friends have way better commutes than what I see my co-workers deal with in the bay. We shouldn't really be criticizing other states when California is definitely not the model for transit and traffic either. LA is a nightmare and SF is getting close to one as more and more tech companies move away from transit centers and force employees to drive.
- CydeWeys 7y ago
  Texas is significantly worse than SF for anyone who doesn't have a car. There aren't good alternatives to driving to get around there. The traffic principally affects you if you drive, hence why Texas is often worse even now than SF.
  - sdnlafkjh34rw 7y ago
    In Texas, you are forced to drive because there isn't public transit. In California, you are forced to drive because you have to live far away from transit centers in order to find affordable housing. Regardless if you look at commuter data, it's pretty obvious that the Bay Area & LA commuters are significantly higher than Texas metros. We have higher median, average, and extremes in commute times: https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/08/22/bay-area-traffic-delays-rank-second-longest-in-nation/ https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/08/22/bay-area-traffic-dela... https://www.apartmentlist.com/rentonomics/traffic-trains-or-teleconference-the-changing-american-commute/ https://www.apartmentlist.com/rentonomics/traffic-trains-or-...

joshuaheard 7y ago

And no state income tax.

jimmaswell 7y ago

Friendly if you're the right political party and orientation, I hear.

atlantacrackers 7y ago
Have you ever visited? Talked to locals? You might be surprised how friendly people are IRL.
- munin 7y ago
  I lived in Dallas and it is the only place I've lived where people would scream homophobic slurs at me in the street. I wouldn't say I'd never move back, but the situation would have to be dire for me to consider it. Definitely cut your hair if you visit.
  - bsagdiyev 7y ago
    That's not unique to Texas, just assholes. I've seen it here in San Diego while walking through Hillcrest.
    - munin 7y ago
      I dunno, 40 years of living in other places, stuff like this only happens in Texas and the South. There are definitely assholes in NY and Boston but they won't get up in my grill for "looking gay" on the street so that's pretty neat.
    - bsagdiyev 7y ago
      I concede and won't argue with personal experience. It sucks that it is still a thing anywhere, hopefully we'll get there some day.
    - scurvy 7y ago
      It happened to me in Chicago, twice in one weekend. All I did was wear a pink shirt and walk down the street. That was enough to garner homophobic slurs. I'm not gay and when I mentioned it to one of my Chicago friends, and he just shrugged his shoulders and said, "Yeah." tl;dr jerks are everywhere

aphextron 7y ago

>"Cheap real estate" And the highest property tax rate in the nation.

toomuchtodo 7y ago
Isn’t Prop 13 an enormous issue (with real estate owners not paying taxes on the true value of their property) in California?
- dgoldstein0 7y ago
  Prop 13 basically just limits increases in taxes from purchase time. So it benefits existing land owners at the expense of future land owners. And it also benefits speculators - makes it cheaper to hold onto property for longer.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
burlesona 7y ago
Because of the highest property tax in the nation. This is a feature, not a bug. It’s very difficult for the wealthy to hide their property. There are also a number of ways to reduce the tax rate on one’s primary residence. Combined effect of this is surprisingly progressive, closer to a wealth tax. Another effect high property taxes, is that most existing homeowners feel some pain when real estate prices soar and therefore there is a large contingent of voters who want to make sure that supply keeps up with demand so that their taxes don’t go up. By contrast, where I live (in San Francisco), the existing homeowners make out like bandits when the government policies are punitively exclusionary towards outsiders. Soaring home prices mean nothing but good for homeowners when their taxes are both very low and virtually frozen at the original purchase price by prop 13.
- cgriswald 7y ago
  Don't forget the joy of parcel taxes, city and county sale taxes, and other ways of bleeding you out to make up for the people who aren't paying their fair share because of Prop 13; which you still have to pay even if prop 13 doesn't help you because you were born in the wrong decade.

newnewpdro 7y ago

And large industrial accidents in your back yard, hooray for no zoning laws! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Fertilizer_Company_explosion#Aftermath https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Fertilizer_Company_explos... https://www.beaumontenterprise.com/news/article/The-latest-Explosion-at-Port-Neches-plant-14866093.php https://www.beaumontenterprise.com/news/article/The-latest-E...

stjohnswarts 7y ago
Never been an industrial accident in California, eh?
- newnewpdro 7y ago
  Because that's the purpose of zoning laws, to prevent accidents from occurring at all, right? :rolleyes:
newnewpdro 7y ago
Just remembered this illuminating USCSB coverage of the West Fertilizer explosion: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdDuHxwD5R4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdDuHxwD5R4