All about value

This is how much home can you buy for $200,000 in San Antonio right now

This home is currently listed at $197,000 and includes three bedrooms and two bathrooms.

Courtesy of the San Antonio Board of Realtors

In Texas, San Antonio homebuyers get the most bang for their buck when it comes to home size, according to new data from real estate website PropertyShark.

Among the state's five largest home markets, the report shows that homebuyers in San Antonio can score the biggest digs for $200,000. For that price, you can snag a 3,249-square-foot home in the Alamo City.

That hypothetical $200,000 home actually isn’t far off from the typical price of a home in the San Antonio metro area. In the first quarter of this year, the median home price in the region was $218,250, according to the Texas Association of Realtors.

At the other end of the scale is Austin. For $200,000 you can purchase a house measuring just 1,341 square feet. That's if you can find a house for that price. The median home price in the Austin metro area was $315,000 in the first quarter of this year, 57 percent higher than PropertyShark’s hypothetical $200,000 home.

Elsewhere in the Lone Star State, a Dallas homebuyer can get 1,824 square feet, a Fort Worth homebuyer can snag 2,199 square feet, and a Houston homebuyer can pick up 2,093 square feet. The median home price in Dallas-Fort Worth during the first quarter of this year was $267,500; in Houston, it was a more affordable $239,043, according to the Texas Association of Realtors.

Despite the comparatively cheap home prices in the state’s other big cities, some Texans still find it hard to purchase a place to live.

“Unemployment rates and downward spirals in home values weren’t nearly as bad in Texas during the national economic downturn as they were in other parts of the country. But the state’s large urban areas are still experiencing similar mismatches between housing stock and income as other American metropolitan areas,” the Texas Tribune reported in 2017.

Kaki Lybbert, a Denton Realtor who chairs the Texas Association of Realtors, applauds the robust home sales activity around the state but worries that if housing inventory keeps declining while prices keep rising, “we may continue to see affordability challenges across the state.”

In other words, PropertyShark’s hypothetical $200,000 home could become out of reach for even more Texans.

Compared with how far your money won’t go in New York City and San Francisco, $200,000 homes in Texas are practically mansions. According to PropertyShark, $200,000 will give you only 126 square feet in the New York City borough of Manhattan and just 260 square feet in San Francisco. Both of those homes would be tinier than the average U.S. apartment.

Interestingly, the hypothetical $200,000 homes in Dallas, Fort Worth, San Antonio, and Houston are larger than the average homes in those areas. Only Austin’s hypothetical $200,000 home was smaller than the region’s average home.

In 2016, PropertyShark reported these as the average home sizes in Texas’ five biggest cities:

Dallas, 1,433 square feet
Fort Worth, 1,660 square feet
San Antonio, 2,175 square feet
Austin, 2,068 square feet
Houston, 1,713 square feet

Texans are “lucky to live in some of the most spacious urban dwellings in the nation,” PropertyShark says.

home-for-sale lists

bang for your buck

San Antonio ZIP code is 4th most affordable place for renters in U.S.

Photo by Florian Schmid on Unsplash

undefined

Trying to afford buying a home in San Antonio is difficult enough with current mortgage rates, and doubly so if you're already paying high rent on an apartment or a house. But there are six San Antonio ZIP codes where renters can get the most bang for their buck, according to a new study by financial services company CashNetUSA.

To find the most affordable ZIP codes for renters in the U.S., analysts compared median household incomes by ZIP code to the average annual rent costs in those areas using the Zillow Observed Rent Index. ZIP codes where the average annual rental constituted the lowest percentage of median household income were considered the "most affordable."

San Antonio's 78248 ZIP code specifically stood out as the No. 4 most affordable in the country, and the No. 1 most affordable in Texas. This area encompasses the north San Antonio neighborhoods of Inwood, Forests at Inwood, Oakwood, The Park at Deerfield, Canyon Creek Bluffs, Canyon Creek Village, Blanco Village, Deerfield, Cadillac Drive, and Churchill Estates.

According to the study's findings, the average monthly cost of a rental in 78248 comes out to $1,259.17, and the median annual income of a household in the area is $122,986. Analysts then calculated that the annual rent of a home in this ZIP code only takes up 12.29 percent of a household's median income, which is the fourth-lowest in the nation.

CashNetUSA found the No. 1 most affordable ZIP code for renters nationwide is 66224 in Leawood, Kansas, where annual rent only takes a 10.57 percent cut out of a household's median annual income.

Elsewhere in Texas, two Houston-area ZIP codes – 77401 and 77094 – ranked No. 9 and No. 12 nationally, while Allen's 75013 ZIP code fell two spots behind to claim the No. 14 spot.

The most affordable San Antonio-area ZIP codes for renters
CashNetUSA further unveiled the five most affordable ZIP codes across major U.S. cities, including in San Antonio, Austin, and Houston.

Following 78248 (which took the No. 1 spot citywide) is 78261 (No. 2), which spans east of Highway 281, across Smithson Valley Road. Rent costs in this ZIP code averaged out to $1,698 per month, the report found.

Landing in the No. 3 spot is 78258, which includes Rogers Ranch, The Vineyard, Stone Oak, Summit, Hidden Canyon, and Big Springs neighborhoods. The report said average rent in the area comes out to $1,507 per month, which takes up 17.54 percent of a household's median annual income.

The remaining top two most affordable ZIP codes for San Antonio renters are located in 78259 (Encino Park, Encino Ranch, Cavalo Creek Estates, Northwood Hills, Summit at Bulverde Creek, Roseheart, Redland Woods) and 78260 in Timberwood Park, which is about 25 miles north of downtown San Antonio.

rent rent prices affordable housing