Moving to the Austin, Texas area. Q & A please

[DEW0341]

After 12 years of being in the Marine Corps my wife and I have made the family decision that it’s time for me to get out so that we can settle down somewhere. Wife works remote so work wise she will relocate rather easy to Austin and I’ll be job hunting starting now until I get out this summer, and my grand parents live in Georgetown so it will be nice to spend time with them. My wife is from upstate New York and neither of us have ever been to Texas. I grew up in Utah and since graduating HS bounced around from Hawaii to California and back to Hawaii. We have always said we would just pick a spot and go when the time came for me to part ways with the military life. I have some questions about generalities of living around Austin and Hunting of course if anyone minds answering? I appreciate all and any responses!

-Commute during rush hour from the round rock Area to down town Austin and vice versus?

-Is their a toll for highway use?

-Avg cost of utilities winter/summer?

-Property tax cost?

-What is a comfortable salary to live on? I realize this is open to interpretation, I would consider my wife middle class fancy if that helps. We have always lived on base in mil housing, so having a stand alone home with a yard big enough for the kids, me to shoot my bow, a decent garage etc will be AWESOME!

-How does hunting in Texas generally work? I have looked at the state website but doesn’t lead me many places to figure anything out. I am used to public land western hunting in Utah, Colorado and California. Am I going to have to pay hundreds of dollars to go hunt ranches, knock on doors, or get to know a guy etc?

-Aranges around Austin? 3d or indoor. I shoot traditional.

-Long distance shooting ranges? Love shooting club level PRS matches.


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[CentexBowhunter]

Plenty of 3D shoots around the Round Rock and Georgetown area. I live about an hour North of Austin. Traffic can get nasty during rush hour. Hunting in Texas can definitely be a little tough. Haven’t done a whole lot of hunting on public, but there are some opportunities. Fort Hood has some hunting open to the public. Texas is a great place to live though! Welcome!

 

[BRTreedogs]

Ohh man I couldn't imagine living somewhere without tons on public land and mountains.
Yes it super expensive in the west. But man its great.

 

[Packin_packout]

There are toll roads on the east side of town and then 183 / Mopac... Austin proper is a town that has refused to build highways so inside Town traffic is nasty. Utility cost gets bad in the summer for air conditioning starting in May running through September to October. Get a good high efficiency air conditioner.

Property taxes are nasty in Texas. I pay almost as much in taxes as I do for mortgage due to housing prices ripping up here especially in austin.. and you can look at the Central Appraisal District websites for where you are looking to figure out tax rates for similar houses.

You are stuck getting a lease to hunt small plots of land out here. Very little door knocking out here because every rancher makes money leasing the land to hunters. There is public land but there's nowhere near as much as you are used to.

 

[DEW0341]

There are toll roads on the east side of town and then 183 / Mopac... Austin proper is a town that has refused to build highways so inside Town traffic is nasty. Utility cost gets bad in the summer for air conditioning starting in May running through September to October. Get a good high efficiency air conditioner.

Property taxes are nasty in Texas. I pay almost as much in taxes as I do for mortgage due to housing prices ripping up here especially in austin.. and you can look at the Central Appraisal District websites for where you are looking to figure out tax rates for similar houses.

You are stuck getting a lease to hunt small plots of land out here. Very little door knocking out here because every rancher makes money leasing the land to hunters. There is public land but there's nowhere near as much as you are used to.

Is there a website or anything for the hunting leases?


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[Gatorgrizz27]

I lived there for a few years around 2011/2012, IMO you’re about 10 years too late.

I went there for the music scene and had a successful motorcycle business, we had a blast and made a lot of money. There are lots of great places to eat and day trip type outdoor stuff to do.

Austin isn’t really what it used to be, which was just Texas where they wouldn’t disown you for having long hair, smoking weed, or being gay. Now it’s pretty much “California lite.” Not sure how the music or food/bar industry will recover from the current situation.

The final straws for me were fighting tickets for having my dog off leash in a huge wilderness park along a creek because someone had complained, fighting a ticket for rolling through a stop sign on a bicycle (didn’t), buddy fought a DWI for 3 empty beer cans in the bed of his truck with mold growing in them, etc.

You should be able to see what housing costs are, property taxes have gotten insane though, to the point that many people have had to sell off paid for homes.

I found that if I was still downtown after about 3:30 pm, I might as well just go into a bar and listen to some music and eat dinner, as it was going to take me ~ 2 hours to get home, it was normally a 20 minute drive with no traffic.

There isn’t much public huntable land at all, there’s a military base somewhere that you might get lucky and see a hog. Best place to look for a lease is probably on the Texas Bowhunter website, they have gotten harder to find and more expensive though.

A lot of guys have given up on them and basically do a day hunt place to get some venison and then a guided elk hunt out west every year, as it’s cheaper to do that now.

Best of the west in Liberty hill has a 1,000 yard rifle range. There was also a range we liked also called eagle peak, and I remember seeing some archery range/club stuff type out by Lake Travis.

IMO, unless you have a compelling reason to pick Austin over other areas in Texas (family, music, tech jobs), I’d look elsewhere right now.

 

[Reburn]

best of the west is closed so you know.

 

[Cody_W]

I’m 45 minutes west, good luck hunting unless you have a buddy or buy land without getting a lease. There is a leasing website called leasehunter.com that I know guys have had success with. Taxes are two fold. Property taxes are dependent upon the value of the place really, the rates are generally low 1%. I’m not sure what other people expect property taxes to be, but there is a reason we have nice infrastructure. I don’t mind the 10k a year towards that, being it’s saving so much on the income tax side. i rarely have traffic issues when I come to town, but I don’t do it that often so I can’t speak to it much.

 

[CentexBowhunter]

I lived there for a few years around 2011/2012, IMO you’re about 10 years too late.

I went there for the music scene and had a successful motorcycle business, we had a blast and made a lot of money. There are lots of great places to eat and day trip type outdoor stuff to do.

Austin isn’t really what it used to be, which was just Texas where they wouldn’t disown you for having long hair, smoking weed, or being gay. Now it’s pretty much “California lite.” Not sure how the music or food/bar industry will recover from the current situation.

The final straws for me were fighting tickets for having my dog off leash in a huge wilderness park along a creek because someone had complained, fighting a ticket for rolling through a stop sign on a bicycle (didn’t), buddy fought a DWI for 3 empty beer cans in the bed of his truck with mold growing in them, etc.

You should be able to see what housing costs are, property taxes have gotten insane though, to the point that many people have had to sell off paid for homes.

I found that if I was still downtown after about 3:30 pm, I might as well just go into a bar and listen to some music and eat dinner, as it was going to take me ~ 2 hours to get home, it was normally a 20 minute drive with no traffic.

There isn’t much public huntable land at all, there’s a military base somewhere that you might get lucky and see a hog. Best place to look for a lease is probably on the Texas Bowhunter website, they have gotten harder to find and more expensive though.

A lot of guys have given up on them and basically do a day hunt place to get some venison and then a guided elk hunt out west every year, as it’s cheaper to do that now.

Best of the west in Liberty hill has a 1,000 yard rifle range. There was also a range we liked also called eagle peak, and I remember seeing some archery range/club stuff type out by Lake Travis.

IMO, unless you have a compelling reason to pick Austin over other areas in Texas (family, music, tech jobs), I’d look elsewhere right now.

Stuff is opening back up relatively well down here. But yes I agree, I would look on the outskirts of Austin if you can. Pretty crowded area for sure. Never really been a big fan. As Gatorgrizz mentioned, Texas Bowhunter is probably the best resource to find leases that I have found. Its tough to find em though.

 

[Fitzwho]

As far as leases go, think more like spending thousands of dollars, not hundreds. There are public draws for hunts on state parks, etc, but I haven’t ever been able to draw any of them.

I don’t live in Austin anymore. My property taxes I’m Midland are 2.2% so I pay more into my escrow account than actually goes toward my mortgage. I rented for the 3 years I lived in Austin, so I can’t comment on what taxes were in that area.

I always found morning traffic wasn’t as bad as the evening. Usually twice as long headed home. I would look for work, then figure out the closest place from that location you can afford to live.

I usually tell people that if you are bored in Austin, it’s your own fault. Plenty of outdoors stuff to do as well. Should be an easy transition from the trad bow to the fly rod. The best thing about Texas as an outdoorsman is the availability of public water. There is no shortage of rivers and lakes to fish around Austin. Plus you’re 2.5-3 hours from the beach and great saltwater fishing.

I have a little easier access to the west, so that’s what I do. If I ever move south again, I will have to rethink a lot of my western hunting, or at least how I get myself to them.

 

[jwelch1103]

What everyone else said plus, if you like HOT summers you will love it in that part of Texas

 

[jwelch1103]

One other thing, if you do go there and you like cowboy boots you must check out Heritage Boots on Congress Avenue, they make damn fine boots!

 

[Northpark]

In laws live in San Antonio and my wife has a lot of let’s just say we’ll off family in TX in general. They all moved away from Austin to Dallas, and San Antonio because of the cost of living. Unless you have a compelling need to live in Austin I would take a strong look at SA. Better cost of living, easier access to the coast for great saltwater fishing. As far as hunting goes TX is a pay to play state. Some fun hunting but leases are expensive. Better off paying what they call a day lease and hunting. Then taking one out of state trip to NM, CO, AZ etc. A lot of high fence places and some low fence. Lots of exotic hunts which I actually do once or twice a year whenever I’m in that area because it’s fun. My Tx hunt this year is mixed bag low fence axis deer/hog/Catalina goat.

 

[eamyrick]

Commute during rush hour from the round rock Area to down town Austin and vice versus?

Commute from Round Rock/Georgetown is 30 min to 1.5 hours depending on time of day. You need to live close to the toll for it to make sense.


-Avg cost of utilities winter/summer?

2010 house 2800 sq ft electric/utility are around $300.

-Property tax cost?
-What is a comfortable salary to live on? I realize this is open to interpretation, I would consider my wife middle class fancy if that helps. We have always lived on base in mil housing, so having a stand alone home with a yard big enough for the kids, me to shoot my bow, a decent garage etc will be AWESOME!

When I moved here in 2009 you could buy a nice house for 150-170k. Starter home is now 320k. Salaries around here haven’t gone up much for public sector. Gas is much cheaper generally than other places in the country. I would want 125k joint minimum and go from there depending on childcare cost.
-How does hunting in Texas generally work? I have looked at the state website but doesn’t lead me many places to figure anything out. I am used to public land western hunting in Utah, Colorado and California. Am I going to have to pay hundreds of dollars to go hunt ranches, knock on doors, or get to know a guy etc?

Hunting equals lease or out of state travel. Leases aren’t plug and play. It took me 10 years to get a decent one. Expect to spend 3k. There is ample public land pig (bow) and duck opportunities close to north Austin.

-Long distance shooting ranges? Love shooting club level PRS matches.

best of the west closed due to encroaching neighborhoods. Gonna have to drive for long range.

PM me if you have anymore questions.

 

[Gatorgrizz27]

Bummer to hear BOTW closed, I wasn’t a huge fan of their setup where you couldn’t ever go down range to check targets, but 1,000 yard ranges are few and far between.

 

[Still Hunter]

Austifornia!? you will regret it!

 

[Where's Bruce?]

Austin...it's like Berkeley without the nice weather. You are gonna be blue. https://austin.culturemap.com/news/city-life/09-12-16-best-american-cities-liberals/

 

[DEW0341]

I’ll be in Georgetown north of Austin.


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[DEW0341]

Austifornia!? you will regret it!

Care to elaborate? I won’t be in Austin proper, north a little ways in Georgetown.


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[DEW0341]

Austin...it's like Berkeley without the nice weather. You are gonna be blue. https://austin.culturemap.com/news/city-life/09-12-16-best-american-cities-liberals/

Tracking


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