North Texas Is No. 1

New rankings declare Dallas-area first-time homebuyers have it made

Looking to buy? Look in McKinney.

Photo courtesy of Ebby Halliday Realtors

Rents are soaring, so logic says that maybe it's time to buy. But how easy will that be in Dallas-Fort Worth? WalletHub says very, according to its latest rankings of the best and worst cities for first-time homebuyers.

Not only are four of Dallas' suburbs in the top 10, but the top three are all North Texas: McKinney is No. 1, Frisco second, and Allen third. Richardson sneaks in at No. 7, but Denton (No. 11), Carrollton (No. 18), and Grand Prairie (No. 21) also rank highly.

The personal finance site compared 300 cities of varying sizes across across 23 key indicators of market attractiveness, affordability, and quality of life. Broken down into weighted metrics, that means things such as cost of homeowners insurance, median home-price appreciation, recession recovery, job market, and even weather were taken into consideration.

While McKinney's affordability isn't stellar (No. 191), its real estate market (No. 1) and quality of life (No. 7) rankings more than make up for it. With a total score of 68.32 out of 100, McKinney just barely holds onto the lead from Frisco's 68.2 and Allen's 68.15.

Allen ranks second overall for lowest property crime rate, while Laredo has the cheapest cost of living. If you separate the cities by population into large (more than 300,000 people), midsize (150,000-300,000), and small (fewer than 150,000 residents), McKinney still comes out on top for midsize, while Frisco and Allen clean up with first and second for the small category. Fort Worth shows up at No. 5 on the large cities list.

Elsewhere on the list, Plano ranks No. 29, Fort Worth is No. 33, and Garland takes No. 45. Closing out the top 100 are Amarillo (No. 51), Mesquite (No. 72), Austin (No. 86), Arlington (No. 96), Irving (No. 99). Where's Dallas? All the way down at No. 120, which is only slightly better than No. 136 San Antonio and Houston at No. 186.

Not surprisingly, four of the bottom five cities are in California: Santa Monica, Oakland, and Berkeley join Miami Beach, with Santa Barbara coming in dead last.

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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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