Price brrrrrreak

One season is hottest to buy a rental home in DFW, study says

Home prices are seasonal due to the school year.

Photo courtesy of Austin Board of Realtors

If you’re hunting for a single-family rental home in Dallas-Fort Worth, the buyer’s market is hottest when it’s cold outside.

A new study by HomeUnion, an online platform for real estate investment and management, shows you can score a 17.3 percent discount on a single-family rental home in DFW if you buy it during the winter instead of the summer. HomeUnion puts the median summertime price of a single-family rental home in DFW at $201,900, compared with a wintertime price of $167,000.

In its review of single-family rental homes for major metro areas, HomeUnion found wintertime is the best time to snag bargains on single-family rental homes around the country.

Among the top 10 bargain metros in HomeUnion’s ranking, single-family rental homes are discounted between 20 percent and 32 percent in the winter months versus the summer months. DFW appears at No. 18 in the ranking of bargain markets.

“Median home prices drop substantially during the colder months, while rent losses remain marginal for landlords,” says Steve Hovland, research director at HomeUnion.

“Home prices are seasonal, as many buyers and sellers delay an acquisition or disposition to avoid a move during a school year,” he adds. “As a result, smaller homes occupied by empty nesters or childless families are more likely to change hands.”

The only other Texas metro among HomeUnion’s top 40 bargain markets is Houston, which ranks 25th. In the Houston area, the median price of a single-family rental home is $168,500 during the summer but $145,000 in the winter, a difference of 13.9 percent, according to HomeUnion.

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GP News

Grand Prairie expands to the south with new master-planned community

Rendering courtesy of Provident

Goodland Grand Prairie

The City of Grand Prairie is growing fast and expanding to make way for a new master-planned development south of US Highway 287 and along Tollway 360, in Ellis and Johnson counties.

The community development, called Goodland, is the result of Grand Prairie’s recent 1,500-acre annexation extending its southern border toward Mansfield. Overall, with the added land, Goodland will be a 5,000-acre site featuring 15,000 residences including townhomes, custom homes, and gated communities for 50,000 residents.

According to a release, it will be a “city within a city” and a 45-minute drive from Dallas-Fort Worth. Beyond housing, there will be shops, restaurants, schools, public and private event venues, regional sports fields and complexes, dance halls, churches, trail systems, city parks, ponds, and preserved green spaces.

“This is a significant step in our city’s development,” says Grand Prairie Mayor Ron Jensen in a statement. “Unlike many of our neighboring cities, we have the unique advantage of new development opportunities to our south that will drive the growth and prosperity of our city. We recognized the opportunity and took decisive action.”

Leading the development is Provident, a Dallas-based real estate firm that has created other master-planned communities across Dallas-Fort Worth, such as Preston Hollow Village and Hillstead in Collin County. Provident has plans to work nature into the space design with more than 1,600 acres of creek corridors and floodplain land.

Plans are ongoing for a centralized mixed-use walkable Town Center, complete with civic buildings and other commercial development. Further south on the property near Highway 67, light industrial uses and other private employment campuses are already underway, projects that will contribute vital tax dollars for city growth and future expansions.

“This level of placemaking is quite rare, and certainly not easy to execute, especially in a brand-new community," says Provident Managing Director Rylan Yowell in a statement. "We are committed to a long-term vision with a desire to be good stewards of the land."

A new four-lane road called Goodland Parkway will link Goodland to Grand Prairie at Tollway 360 and US Highway 287. It's set to open by December 2025.

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