Hi y’all, welcome!

Inside: A deal in Mueller 👀 + Free tuition at UT 🤠 

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(*unbiased opinion)

WHAT'S INSIDE

• 🚨 TIPS FROM YOUR REALTOR

• 👀 DEAL OF THE WEEK

• 🤠 WHAT’S HAPPENING AROUND TOWN

• ⁉️ WHAT THIS MEANS FOR YOU

• 🤤 HOUSE WORTH DROOLING OVER

🚨 TIPS FROM YOUR REALTOR

(it’s me)

I’m an ex-dentist turned Realtor - let’s work together! Email me, tweet me or send me a carrier pigeon. 🐦️ 

This was one of my most popular segments - lets run it back 🏃‍♂️ 

New isn’t always better.

With the all the construction in Austin, you may think that a new build is a safe bet.

Wrong.

New builds can be great - but there are a lot of pitfalls to watch out for.

1) Obviously - the house actually needs to get built (sometimes your $80,000 deposit disappears along with the developer…)

2) Quality of build - we’re going to focus on this today.

Quality of Build

Real quickkk sidebar: there was a huge lumber shortage and supply chain disruption during the pandemic building boom. Though lumber price has fallen since its 280% pandemic era spike - prices are still higher than pre-pandemic levels. The price of wood skyrocketed and new developments look a lot like this:

Okay back to it -

Wood = expensive and houses = a lot of wood. Great!

Example 1: Some builders like to cut corners. Kitchen cabinets were historically made of solid wood but we’ve seen a transition to particle board. Now we’re seeing something even crazier, particle board wrapped in plastic…all to save cost.

Looks okay day 1, you might not even notice. But I guarantee you’re less than a year away from the plastic warping and looking like this -

By the way - this is a building in Austin. Let me know if you can guess where 👀 

yikes

Example 2: Historically, bedroom doors are solid wood and closet/pantry doors will be hollow. Solid doors are better for sound/heat insulation and hollow doors are cheaper…

If you pay attention when opening your bedroom door or give it a knock, you’ll be able to tell the difference between the two.

Thorough walkthroughs and negotiations with new builders is really important - the builder will always put their best interests first.

If you have any questions, i’d love to hear from you!

👀 DEAL OF THE WEEK

Here’s a deal for you:
If you want a refresher on how to evaluate deals - check this out.

There are only a few neighborhoods in Austin that have been resistant to the post-pandemic decline. Mueller is one of them. A masterplan community just 10 minutes north of the city - it exploded in popularity during the pandemic. It is accessible to downtown, has a community feel (best farmers market in town) and is filled with walkable amenities (doctor, dentist, HEB, emergency, food, bars, movie theater).

Not to go on too much of a tangent but bear with me - the farmers market eggs are literally unbeatable. Truly, everyone try them.

Ok - back to it.

The average price per square foot of active townhomes in Mueller is $410/ppsqft

This is priced low and ready for a deal: $335ppsqft

List Price: $800,000 ($335ppsqft)
Kirtana’s Suggestion: $775,000 ($324ppsqft)

Why is it priced so low?

1) It’s probably intentional. They’ve priced to sell - the timing of the market hits a lull as we go into the holiday season
2) The townhomes are across from a new, large apartment complex (but, neighbor a park!)
3) You have 100% of the negotiation power here and nothing to lose

Want to check it out? Reply here!

🤠 WHAT’S HAPPENING AROUND TOWN

With prices rising everywhere - here’s some positive news:

The University of Texas system is providing free tuition for students from families earning $100,000 or less.

This includes any of the nine institutions that fall under the UT system umbrella.

According to the UT system - 56% of all UT students receive some form of financial aid.

Dang, where is all this money coming from?

It’s a combination of the universities oil and gas right royalties + gifts/endowments. The UT system has the 2nd largest endowment in the world, coming in at $44.9 Billion (Harvard is #1 with $53B). Surprisingly very little from the state. According to the UT system, in 1990-91 the state provided 34% of the systems total budget and in 2020-21 it accounted for just over 10%.

Read more here.

⁉️ WHAT THIS MEANS FOR YOU

If you’re a buyer/seller/investor/renter or just interested in real estate - this weekly newsletter will help guide your decision making and help you better understand the market.

🤤 HOUSE WORTH DROOLING OVER

With the holidays coming up - sometimes you want to be like Eloise at the Plaza. Here’s Austin’s version:

Nestled inside the W Hotel. Let’s ignore the $4,030 monthly HOA for now 🤫 

Yours for $5,995,000

Thank you for being here! Reply to this email if you have any questions or just to say hello! 👋 

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