Vizcaya vs. Wolf Ranch (Round Rock, Georgetown: insurance, assessor, mortgage)

[loltheinternet]

Hello:

My partner and I are relocating from the midwest, and have a tough decision to make and would like additional input.

We are looking at the Wolf Ranch and the Vizcaya communities, and having trouble deciding which to pursue.

We have a confirmed Vizcaya 63' lot option that we can execute now, and allegedly have a top spot for Wolf Ranch's 'Patio' 46' lot section coming up in March. A bird in hand...

Basically our decision is boiling down to unit size (where Vizcaya is a clear winner, we are leaning towards their "Larimar" plan at 3786 sq ft, vs. Wolf Ranch where we are leaning towards the "Coldspring" plan at 2726 sq ft) vs. location (where we feel Wolf Ranch is a clear winner, with being able to even walk to Wolf Ranch Town Center and having much better natural beauty / running & walking trails).

Cost after lot premiums and structural upgrades is basically a wash.

Our highest priority features are home offices for both of us, outdoor space, a quality media room, access to running trails, and easy access to bars/restaurants for date nights. Vizcaya offers all of the above except (from what we can tell) easy access to bars/restaurants - there is not a single restaurant in walking distance. Wolf ranch offers all of the above except (decent) outdoor space and a quality media room, as well as being a considerably smaller unit overall.

We are a DINK couple with no plans for children at this time.

Any folks here live in either community with strong feelings about them? I've searched the forum and read all the relevant Wolf Ranch and Vizcaya threads, though haven't seen any about choosing directly between the two.

Any and all inputs welcome. Let me know what other information would be useful.

[karpo1]

Ongoing cost difference is property tax, Wolf Ranch: 2.945529% Viscaya: ~2.3%

[ashbeeigh]

Take what you can get right now. There’s some threads on here where people are talking about camping out for lots before they even hit the market as well as paying well over list price.

[riaelise]

Disclaimer - I don't live in either, but am familiar with both of them.

Honestly, as a household of two with no plans of having children, size shouldn't really be a deciding factor. A 3786 sq ft house is a family house and there will be many rooms that you simply won't use. You'll be paying taxes and higher utilities for those unused rooms as well.

I think the Wolf Ranch home is better when it comes to size, even if it lacks a media room. I'll be honest (sorry) in that I consider media rooms to be an unnecessary random room, any room can be a "media room". We watch movies in various other living spaces. You can easily add a platform in a spare bedroom and make that a media center, if you want the "theater experience".

Georgetown's (west side) topography is beautiful, but in all likelihood your house is going to be situated on the standard new home subdivision with two sticks for trees that the builder has planted and no trees in the back. Same as you'd get with Vizkaya.

Wolf Ranch does have the advantage (and that's primarily it's chief advantage) of being next to a shopping mall with restaurants and retail and you can walk there. Vizkaya you'd have to drive, but not very far. University Ave. has plenty of eating options and downtown Round Rock has nice bars and such. Wolf Ranch is also near the endearing Georgetown town square on the other side of the highway, if you'd want to enjoy food other than the chains found in Wolf Ranch (mall).

Vizkaya is a bit closer in and is in a rapidly growing area of Round Rock.

Both offer really small lots (yikes)....a 3700 sq ft house on a 63' lot? Talk about neighbor on neighbor....ugh, I personally couldn't stand that. Same with Wolf Ranch, another biggish home on a ridiculously small lot.

And the tax situation is real. 2.9 is higher than most of Georgetown and if your home is over 400k, that's going to bite. Be prepared for it.

[loltheinternet]

Thanks everyone for your input! These were all very useful in helping us arrive at a decision.

We ended up passing on the Vizcaya lot and are going to hold out for the Wolf Ranch spot. We love the area considerably more, and as riaelise points out, it is much more scenic and has much better options within the immediate vicinity.

We'll see if we come to regret this choice if the potential spot gets delayed or worse

One piece that stood out that I didn't totally grok - riaelise mentioned "2.9 is higher than most of Georgetown and if your home is over 400k" - is there something specific about 400k that makes it worse? Is there some progressive or stepped property tax increase at higher valuations? Or was this just a general statement that as the property value goes up, the same % property tax also goes up?

One other property tax question if folks are able to weigh in - we hear a lot about the homestead exemption, but it's unclear what the actual exemption value is. Is it a straight percentage decrease? Is it a flat dollar amount? What about the solar system exemption?

Thanks for any help!

[riaelise]

Originally Posted by loltheinternet

Thanks everyone for your input! These were all very useful in helping us arrive at a decision.

We ended up passing on the Vizcaya lot and are going to hold out for the Wolf Ranch spot. We love the area considerably more, and as riaelise points out, it is much more scenic and has much better options within the immediate vicinity.

We'll see if we come to regret this choice if the potential spot gets delayed or worse

One piece that stood out that I didn't totally grok - riaelise mentioned "2.9 is higher than most of Georgetown and if your home is over 400k" - is there something specific about 400k that makes it worse? Is there some progressive or stepped property tax increase at higher valuations? Or was this just a general statement that as the property value goes up, the same % property tax also goes up?

One other property tax question if folks are able to weigh in - we hear a lot about the homestead exemption, but it's unclear what the actual exemption value is. Is it a straight percentage decrease? Is it a flat dollar amount? What about the solar system exemption?

Thanks for any help!

There's no progressive or stepped property tax increase at higher valuations, but if your home has a higher appraised value, understandably your tax would be higher. A higher tax rate would translate into more taxes for you. For reference, the appraised value on our home was in the 500s, and we paid over 11k in taxes for the year and our tax rate is 2.3%. At 2.9, we'd have to pay even more...maybe a couple of hundred dollars, don't know off the top of my head right now the exact amount more..but you get the picture. We're almost to 1k a month just for taxes alone, not including homeowner's insurance which has gone way up due to the scarcity of materials and overall higher cost of building these days. Escrow alone is almost a mortgage payment when you think about that. Things to think about when considering areas as well. My mom lives in Georgetown, and her tax rate is 2.18%.

Applying for the homestead exemption is a no brainer and automatically decreases some of the tax burden. It definitely helps. That being said, homeowners exemption doesn't apply to all of the taxing entities, particularly the city and williamson county. Also, the deduction is kinda small for all the remaining entities other than the ISD. For example, for us, it was 5,000 and 3,000 off appraised value for ACC and another entity. I believe that it is a percentage, not a flat amount. Not sure about solar. We don't have solar panels.

[Trainwreck20]

Solar panels are excluded from the appraised value of the home; so, when the tax assessor does appraisals, they will not adjust your home upward in value compared to homes that do not have panels. That said, you might be able to protest tax appraisals based on failure to discount based on solar, not sure.

[Trainwreck20]

Here is a clip from a WCAD for a house in Wolf Ranch. Those are some pretty puny HS exemptions - looks to be 1% for the city and 25k from the ISD. The 3k for the road district is kind of pointless :P.

Anyway, that MUD is the killer compared to other locations, but it will actually slowly go down over time.

If you itemize your taxes, you are currently capped at a maximum of 10k deduction for property taxes, which will be around 350k for a house in the neighborhood. More expensive than that and you don't get to deduct all your taxes anymore.

Oh, btw, I think you are stuck with G'town electric there, so you will have higher than normal electric bills until they eventually age-out of their horrible 'green energy' deal they made some years ago.

[loltheinternet]

Thanks so much for the additional details, this was all really helpful.

If others stumble upon this thread in the future, I found this article to be useful in understanding the bit about Georgetown Electric's green energy deals: https://energynews.us/2019/11/05/sou...-a-texas-town/
and for a different slant: https://www.sierraclub.org/texas/blo...e-energy-texas