Looking at Avery Ranch Home....incite needed! (Austin, Cedar Park: renting, HOA)

[A4orce84]

Hello Everyone,

My wife and I are currently looking at purchasing our very first home in the Avery Ranch Area. We have lived in Austin for a few years now, but are not super familiar with the Avery Ranch / Cedar Park area. So, I thought I would ask here and get some feedback on the area in general.

Does anyone have any thoughts / opinions on buying a home in Avery Ranch area? Possibly, some good things to know about the area, things to avoid, how loud the trains are (since the train track is nearby), etc. From the homes we have seen, we like the Avery Ranch area a lot...so just trying to learn more about the Avery Ranch and surrounding areas.

Any thoughts or feedback would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[A4orce84]

Insight***. Sorry for the typo !

[sloppymeg]

I live in AR and love it. This area was not on my radar when we first moved here, and it was a super pleasant surprise when I overshot Target one day and ended up on ARB.

What do you want to know? There are several Avery Ranchers on here.

[10scoachrick]

Things move at the speed of light up here; so, it seems plenty of folks believe it's OK ! One townhouse in our complex had its first open house yesterday...it's under contract today That's really no surprise. We are about a mile from the railroad tracks; but they have never bothered us from a noise perspective. Hundreds of homes are much closer and the folks there seem very comfortable with living in proximity to the rail line...and of course, that puts many of them very close to the Lakeline Station.

Some of the homes are aging a bit(if you can call being a dozen years old "aging"); but with that brings more mature trees and neighborhoods free of new construction. There IS new construction very close to 183/183A, but it's a couple of miles west of Parmer and the various retail/office/restaurants at that intersection. Still easy to get to, just not necessarily walking distance.

Avery Ranch is nearly 4000 homes with 5 amenities centers, so YMMV on your experience in any particular neighborhood.

After 8 years here, we are very happy with almost everything except the taxes! As you know, AR is inside the city limits of Austin, even though we can see across Brushy Creek to Cedar Park from our driveway.

Depending on 'where' in Austin you have lived, you may find the roads up here quite refreshing in terms of getting N,S,E,W from home. Sure it can get crowded at rush hour; but jumping on Parmer(60mph toward town, 65mph toward Cedar Park) or 183 or the 45Toll is a pleasure compared to many areas of Austin still dealing with roads from the previous century!

By the bye, AR is served by two school districts, RRISD and LeanderISD...if that is a concern. Be sure to check the boundaries if you have kiddos. Any RE agent worth his/her salt will tell you the house you are interested in is in the BETTER of the districts...no matter which one it is!

[A4orce84]

Thanks for the quick updates and answers to my questions! I only have a few questions as of right now:

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1. Can you guys expand on the train tracks in terms of noise? As far as I understand it is a MetroRail (Lite Rail) trains in the day, and freight trains at night. We are moving to 'The Landing' or 'Granite Shoals' community, so fairly close to the tracks. I am a bit concerned around if we will hear anything in terms of noise.

2. What does the HOA cover specifically? I imagine it would be the pools, club-house, and tennis courts. But what else does the HOA cover....yard maintenance? House stuff?

3. What all amenities does avery ranch offer? I tried looking at the avery ranch website, linked here:
Avery Ranch :: Enjoy Life

But not sure how accurate the information is.

4. Is there a Facebook group page or website to learn about the events in the Avery Ranch area?
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Thanks in advance for all of your time and help, it is greatly appreciated!

[10scoachrick]

Originally Posted by A4orce84

Thanks for the quick updates and answers to my questions! I only have a few questions as of right now:

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1. Can you guys expand on the train tracks in terms of noise? As far as I understand it is a MetroRail (Lite Rail) trains in the day, and freight trains at night. We are moving to 'The Landing' or 'Granite Shoals' community, so fairly close to the tracks. I am a bit concerned around if we will hear anything in terms of noise.
Parts of those two neighborhoods are closer to the tracks, for sure. As far as I know, only a couple of trains run during "sleeping hours" and they just rumble through. With my window cracked open, I can hear the rumble; but it would not disturb a 'normal' sleep pattern, IMO. I know some folks who live within 100 yards of the rail and the topic never comes up.. Of course, the closer you are...YMMV There are so few freight trains running that I am caught off guard when the occasional crossing is closed for a few minutes "maybe" once a week during my any-time-of-day travels on ARBlvd and Neenah/Lakeline.

2. What does the HOA cover specifically? I imagine it would be the pools, club-house, and tennis courts. But what else does the HOA cover....yard maintenance? House stuff?
No club house per se in Avery Ranch. Small meeting rooms at the main pool; but any "clubhouse" use would require renting from the AR Golf Club(NOT one of the amenities...other than aesthetics...ARGC is a daily fee course with memberships available to anyone with the $$...tied in with Teravista Golf, IIRC). HOA covers all amenities centers/pools/playgrounds and their upkeep as well as the considerable upkeep of the 'common area' landscaping, etc. Various activities are put on during the year...some pay as you go, others HOA sponsored. There are lighted tennis courts for homeowners and a "Tennis Club" that generally gears itself toward juniors. The RedFish swim team has been very popular in the 4(?) seasons it has been active. The condo units have an additional HOA fee and certain things are covered on those properties; but the SFHomeowners cover 'everything' on their private property. There is considerable 'green space' behind many of the homes as well as the golf course being behind quite a few...those spaces are maintained by the HOA or the golf course, depending on ownership.
3. What all amenities does avery ranch offer? I tried looking at the avery ranch website, linked here:
Avery Ranch :: Enjoy Life

But not sure how accurate the information is.
The "Enjoy Life" web page is pretty accurate but old...I mentioned five pools; but the fifth is under construction. They mention Brushy Creek Lake Park and Trail as an amenity; but AR residents have no special privileges on the Trail...Same with the Golf Club...nice to have; but membership is neither included nor required for residents of AR.

4. Is there a Facebook group page or website to learn about the events in the Avery Ranch area?
There is an Avery Ranch FB page; but it is not as active as the AR Homeowners' FB page(accessible only to home owners in AR). We have a neighborhood 'magazine' that is a darned good advertising vehicle; but somewhat limited in editorial content in its first few months. Still a good way to get an idea of activities in the 'hood. I'll post a contact for the magazine if I can put my hands on one.
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Thanks in advance for all of your time and help, it is greatly appreciated!

Whew! That's off the top of my head...happy to be more specific if you need.

[COCUE]

What Coach Rick said 😁

We moved to AR some 2 years ago and have really loved our experience to date. My kids are enjoying elementary and love the pools which use quite often during the summer.

Location wise, it's been great with most of our shopping needs within 10-15 minutes drive (3 HEBs, 2 Targets, 3 Walmarts, Sprouts, Randalls, Lakeline mall and a multitude of restaurants options). Not sure if you have kids, but it's great for proximity to lots of kids friendly locations.. we spend a lot of time at the Y in Cedar Park and there's quite a few gymnastics, ballet, martial, kumon /tutoring type places, swim lessons like nitro,ermler etc and the crazy indoor preschool - 3rd grade kids play places like hop n happy and headache inducing places like catch air and the unlimited# of froyo places.. you really don't have to travel that far too get most of what you and your family needs.

Our house is ~10 old and no issues per say that we've noticed. We've replaced all the appliances a year and half ago because I wanted new and shiny😁 and SS. HVAC is still working although the maintenance people have told us each of the 2 annual check that it was on its last legs and tried to sell us new system but it's still working and cooling and heating as appropriate so we are waiting for it to really die before we spend $10k that that estimated for the 2 units that we have. Roof seems okay per our insurrection 2 years ago during purchase. Sprinklers working okay.

The only other things were replaced were all our toilets.. for some reason, they broke one after the other last year.. continuous flushing even after plumber coming to fix multiple times, water leaking out inside the toilet causing increased water bill etc.. got to the point that it wasn't worth calling a plumber with a $110 minimum Everytime when we could change out toilets for $300.. so went ahead and did that.


The other thing that we have is a hairline crack (blink and you will miss it on the ceiling of our top floor living area ~3ft long.. inspector said it was "settling of the house" and we also had another person come out to check when we were buying and they said same thing.. still looks the same today, no increase.. All in all, house seems to be aging great and we love it and the area