Texas Claims Top 5 Spots for Real Estate Construction
 

Top 5, over the last decade:

1. Houston
2. San Antonio
3. Austin
4. Fort Worth
5. Dallas

https://www.storagecafe.com/blog/mos...e-development/

Looking at the Census numbers, Houston and Dallas are #1 and #2 for building permits for this year, so far. And generally in the top three almost every year. But that's about it. Austin is a ways down, and SA is nowhere near the top 5.

Dallas is growing much faster than Houston, but Houston is permitting much faster. That's kind of interesting.

Well, it is the 2nd largest/most populous state after Cali with 30 million people or 3/4 the population of Canada so it's not a shocker. The population has been consistently growing at 4 or 5 million per decade.

What are they counting? It looks like city-of, and they're missing most of each metro. In my region I only see Seattle and Tacoma, and the numbers seem plausible in that context.

Seattle comes out well though, at #5 for multifamily and #4 for offices. The stuff the tends to boom in sprawly places wasn't that plentiful -- retail, industrial, houses. If we were building a lot of those things in the Seattle city limits, it wouldn't be a good sign!

PS, "real estate construction" is an odd title. Usually industry people say "commercial and residential real estate" for what it looks like they're counting.

Houston has nearly 8x the land area and 3x the population as Seattle.

No, its not that simple. This isn't comparing states to states, its comparing cities.

NYC/LA/Chicago are much much bigger than even Dallas and yet they don't permit as much.

Dallas is where these other cities were generations ago and NYC/LA/Chicago have largely leveled out as growth centers. Dallas, Houston, Phoenix, etc. are still in their 'growth' phase.

Without metro information there's not much basis for that discussion.

I'm sure the Texas cities would be at or near the top of any square footage growth tally. Cities like these get massive amounts of growth in types that don't happen much in the more urban cities.

Would be curious to see the numbers for King/Pierce county.

If those cities permitted more, the housing costs will be lower.
At least NY/SF/LA have huge housing shortages, even with modest population growth.
Remember, the actual developers are making money regardless. As long as their construction costs are less than the sale price.
It is in the best interests of the landlords to keep supply down (and somehow they got activist renters on board as well).

^ Chicago strikes a better balance than the coastal biggies.

But a big ingredient in that equation is just much lower overall demand, which places like LA and SF don't really control.



Also, quality > quantity IMO.

I'd take a city with 50K new multi-family units primarily in true urban-oritented, finer-grained infill buildings over a city with 100K new multi-family units primarily in "Texas donut" style complexes.

They don't have as much empty space? At least LA/NYC/Bay Area. Chicago looks to me like it has some excess land and redevelopment opportunities.

100% true.

One small example:

Englewood 1960: 97,595

Englewood 2020: 24,369



Chicago has numerous challenges, but land availability is not one of them.

We need more humans, not more land.

Chicago is like the anti-San Francisco.

Again Texas is still growing consistently at 400,000 to 500,000/yr. The largest cities would have the biggest recipient share of that growth. Texas is the 2nd largest State by area after Alaska. It's larger than California by 105,000 sq miles!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...tories_by_area

As JManc stated, these Texas cities are still in their large growth phase.
NY, Chicago, LA have long since passed their mega growth stage despite ever taller towers being built in these cities.

Importantly, the growth in Texas is almost all in the eastern, central and far southern parts of the state (mainly the "triangle" and the Valley). So the total land area of the state is not all that relevant to its population growth.

fair

Geography plays a huge factor in how far TX's metros can sprawl compared to NY/LA/SF or Chicago which have water, mountains or both. All the TX cities have no such constraints and can sprawl halfway to China.

i’m just pissed marfa has boomed so much.

those dam artsy ny’ers make and then ruin everything.

also, might wanna look closer at the residential permits. i don’t think there is err, room, much less desire, for 77 subdvisions in many major cities like there is in houston for example, per the real estate link below. and these are just the ones about to open, can you imagine planned and u/c?


Currently, home builders in Houston are about to open 77 new communities here. NewHomeSource makes it easy to find all the new neighborhoods in Houston. Our listings are updated daily directly from the home builders, giving home shoppers the most accurate and freshest listings. It's time to find your dream home in the perfect new community today.

https://beta.newhomesource.com/commu...omingsoon=true

of course, to be fair, there is more creative and urban styled development as well, but holy cow do they got room to build.

Although Houston's metro sprawl in certain directions is limited by Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico. Corpus Christi can't grow to the east because of the Gulf. El Paso has the mountains, but the sprawl just goes around the mountains.