Home on the Ranch

Dallas loves this architectural style for homes the most

Spring Branch Central home for sale 4211 Birchton Street

There's no shortage of ranch-style homes in Dallas.

Photo courtesy of Redfin

In Texas, which boasts the most ranches of any state in the country, it’s fitting that ranch-style homes are the most popular architectural style for residences. Dallas-Fort Worth homeowners especially love ranchers.

A survey by Trulia, an online marketplace for residential real estate, found that ranch-style homes push aside other types of homes — including Colonial, Cape Cod, Victorian, midcentury modern, Tudor and Georgian — for likability among Texas adults.

As a refresher, ranch-style homes are single-story structures with features like a low roofline, open floor plan, rectangular or L shape, and a stucco, brick, or wood exterior.

In Texas, you can find the most ranch-style homes on the market in the Fort Worth-Arlington area, Trulia reports; Dallas-Plano-Irving comes in at No. 4. Here are the top areas in the state for ranch-style homes listed on Trulia, ranked from the highest percentage to the lowest:

1. Fort Worth-Arlington
2. San Antonio
3. El Paso
4. Dallas-Plano-Irving
5. Austin
6. Houston

Overall, the Trulia survey shows Americans favor craftsman-style homes (43 percent), followed by ranch (41 percent) and Colonial (36 percent). However, most U.S. adults 55 and over (52 percent) vote for ranch-style homes.

“Each architectural style across the country adds character and charm to a neighborhood, making each one unique,” Lynnette Bruno, Trulia’s vice president of communications and research, says in a release.

Party Is Over

Party City chain to close 21 stores across Dallas by February

Party City

A chain of stores where the party is always going on is closing down: Party City will close all of its stores and has initiated layoffs, effective immediately. According to CNN, CEO Barry Litwin told corporate employees that Party City has to “commence a winddown process immediately,” and that Friday would be their last day of work for the company.

However, the actual store locations, including those around North Texas, will be open until February 28.

Founded in 1986 and headquartered in Woodcliff Lake, New Jersey, Party City is largest party goods retailer in the U.S. — the go-to destination for every type of celebration, with more than 700 company-owned and franchise store locations across North America selling home decor, candles, balloons, wrapping paper, tableware, bulk candy, baking supplies, and more.

A typical Party City store ranges in size from 10,000 to 12,000 square feet and carries approximately 30,000 items. Halloween accounts for as much as one-quarter of yearly sales, but they celebrate all seasonal holidays, from New Year's Eve to the Fourth of July to Father's Day to Super Bowl Sunday, and offer a wide array of merchandise for birthday parties, bar mitzvahs, wedding and bridal showers, and baby showers.

Party and costume merchandise has become more competitive in recent years, with companies like the budget-focused Spirit Halloween expanding beyond its Halloween pop-ups into “Spirit Christmas” stores, as well as competition from Amazon and other online retailers.

In 2023, the chain filed for bankruptcy, then emerged with a plan that included transitioning into a privately held company and canceling nearly $1 billion in debt. At that time, there were approximately 800 U.S. stores.

There are 64 stores in Texas, with 21 in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, as follows:

Arlington
Burleson
Carrollton
Cedar Hill
Dallas
Denton
Euless
Flower Mound
Fort Worth
Frisco
Hurst
Irving
Lake Worth
Lewisville
Mansfield
McKinney
Mesquite
Richardson
Rockwall
Watauga

Dallas-Fort Worth stores have already started sales between 5 and 50 percent off.

holidays closings