News on Local News
Lake Travis Water Level Continues to Rise
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Lake Travis is 40.3 feet below the full pool of 681.00 feet.
We’ve all heard the phrase, “Good things come to those who wait.” Well we’ve all waited for a long time and Austin custom homes are finally getting the rain they need for their yards to become lush and GREEN! More importantly, not that your perfectly manicured lawn isn’t important to us, Lake Travis is now up 14ft since January 24th! Austin has received 5.38” of rain so far in March bring the total rainfall for the year to 13.12”. That’s nearly twice the average amount rainfall we see by this point this year.
If we continue to get monthly rain total like we had in March, the Lake will be filled back to capacity by June 30th. In the storm system that came through last week, the Lake rose 7ft in only four days. All we need are six more storms like that to come through and the Lake will be ready to go by summertime. On average May and June have the most rainfall. Back in 2007, between March 26th and April 1st, Lake Travis rose an astounding 12ft. Also, 2007 was the last time the lake rose 14ft within the first three months of the year. Hopefully this year’s trend continues to be reminiscent of 2007. Frankly, we are tired of seeing “Sometimes Island”. We think that the lake will fill up by June 30th, but maybe we’re looking at the glass half full.
More jobs means more homes.
If you’ve kept up with your Austin luxury home builder’s blog posts recently, you can see a reoccurring theme. We are very interested in the local economy. We believe it is important to monitor your local economy just as much as you do the national economy because the different areas in the United States can sometimes be too diverse to generalize into one group. When you look at the national economy as an average of all the different metros, both high and low outliers have a much bigger impact on the average, especially when there are more low outliers than high. However, it’s never a bad thing for your local economy to be one of those high outliers, like Austin.
The Austin American Statesman came out with an article a few days ago, discussing Austin’s job growth. Over the past eight years, Austin has set the pace among the 50 largest metro areas in the nation in job growth. Since 2004, Austin has added 140,200 jobs representing a 21.3 percent increase, significantly larger than the second place Houston area which has only had 15.7 percent job growth, mainly due to the rise in the energy sector. That does not even include the 3,600 jobs Apple Inc. will bring as they set to expand to Austin.
Lakeway Regional Medical Center
After breaking ground in July of 2009, Lakeway Regional Medical Center will be open for services on April 16th. The 250,000 square-foot facility is anticipated to service more than 100,000 people in an area that extends from FM 2222 and Steiner Ranch, through Lakeway, down to Dripping Springs, and out to Spicewood. That also covers a majority of the locations in which your Austin custom home builder has built homes. The medical center will have a heliport so, if necessary, services could extend to the north shores of Lake Travis, too.
LRMC will be host to 106 Licensed Beds in private rooms, 6 Operating Rooms, 2 Endoscopy Rooms, 2 Pain Management Rooms, 8 Urgent Care Rooms, 3 Trauma & 12 ED Treatment Rooms, 6 Labor Delivery Recovery Rooms, 2 Delivery Dooms/C-Section, 73 Med Surg Private Patient Rooms, 11 Bed Neonatal Critical Care Unit, 18 Bed Critical Care Unit, and 3 Cardiac Cath Suites. In addition, LRMC will serve as a Level II Trauma Center, one of only two in the Austin area.
LRMC is expected to employ about 250 when it opens with about 110 of them being doctors. At the end of its first six month, it could employ 500 people, and 1,000 by the end of its first year.
If you will be working at the medical center and are looking for luxury custom homes in the area, Sterling Custom Homes has your immediate solution. We currently have a home for sale and ready for move-in. It’s conveniently located minutes from LRMC in Flintrock Falls at 111 Escavera Cove.
Austin’s Economy Among the Top in Nation
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Is the housing market coming back?
Good news continues to emerge for those in the market for custom homes in Austin. The U.S. economy is showing evidence of an upturn. It’s not quite on the level increase we saw in the mid-90′s by any stretch of imagination, but even the slightest of upturn can give us hope for the near future. After all the Dow Jones did touch 13,000 points today for the first time since May 20, 2008.
It’s no secret that Texas has not been hit as hard as the rest of the nation during the recession. That being said, it’s not hard to believe that the Texas economy is bouncing back faster than other parts of the country as well. According to the monthly Economic Indicators report on the Central Texas region prepared by the Austin Chamber of Commerce, three of the top eleven U.S. metros that experienced growth in employment and growth in per capita GDP from 2010 to 2011 are from Texas (1 – Houston, 2 – Dallas, and 11 – Austin).
This home features green products, like spray-foam insulation.
A few years ago, your friends might have called you crazy if you mentioned making your Austin custom homes more environmentally friendly. The trend of including green initiatives is on the rise and it’s no surprise since we like to “Keep Austin Weird” while we “Keep Austin Beautiful.” Recently Time Magazine produced an article about how Austin is the one of the “greenest” cities in America.
For the past decade or so Austin has become very well known for it’s growth in the Tech sector and industry while competing with Silicon Valley. This growth coupled with Austin’s devotion to preserving the environment has created a large increase in start-up companies that combine the Tech industry with green initiatives. The article in Time Magazine highlights a few of these tech start-ups. Between the Silicon Hills, the fresh young minds from The University of Texas, and the trendiness of the green lifestyle, Austin has become a leader in technological advances in the green industry.
Austin TX custom home builders are doing their part to build “greener” homes. Here at Sterling Custom Homes, it’s nearly become the standard to use spray-foam insulation that greatly decreases the amount of energy your A/C must use during the hotter months, including this month. Geez, who knew we’d be needing the A/C in January this year. I digress. We install energy efficient windows, doors, and more. The appliances we install are Energy-Star approved. There has even been talk around here about newer green technologies that we can start implementing with future homes we build.