Helping Katy Area

[ekarl17]

Helping the Katy Area

Current Problems:

1.Social Gap ocurring, that in the future may result in in a conflict between North Katy, and South Katy.

2.Development is ocurring mostly in South Katy

3.This fact, makes North Katy less valuable

4.Low income people coming to North Katy, which makes "Katy" less desirable no matter where you live, either north or south. People from Alief ISD and Houston ISD "ghetto" say they live in Katy which makes outsiders think that Katy is a bad area.

5.This people will make our schools be low performance schools, as the ones where they came from

6."they think they move into a nice area, but they are the ones who in less than 10 years will make this area as the one where they came from"

7.We need to encourage more fancy development for middle and high class folks in north katy and south katy

8.This new development will make the katy area more undesirable for low performance students to come

9.Encouraging development like "The Grand Mall", "Memorial Hermann Katy Hospital", Grand Parkway to 290, high-end anchors

10.Then Katy, will be a nice place to live, and work.

What do you think, is this true? Please give opinions to the public, and encourage developers to build more subdivisions in north katy and south katy.

[Trae]

North Katy is getting that new Simon Mall. A lot of people from Alief and rough parts of Houston are moving there (North Katy). Reason: cheaper homes.

[KatyGuy]

North Katy is getting that new Simon Mall. A lot of people from Alief and rough parts of Houston are moving there (North Katy). Reason: cheaper homes.

Any idea on when this mall (new Simon Mall) is going to be built? Do we know if this mall will really happen? Thanks!

[sttombiz]

I would hardly consider homes over 150k the ghetto. Alief/Sharpstown homes are equal to about half that if not less. North Katy is still nice just not as nice as South. Besides the new Bridgeland development will equate a better northern Katy if youre so scared of the fact.

Besides North Katy has always disliked South Katy just how every economic class has always disliked the other. Its out of jealousy or hubris from the higher level. Also Taylor does have a bunch of whiny brats, maybe Mayde Creek should teach them a lesson. The test scores for Mayde Creek and Morton Ranch are not that high. I do not like it in that sense. They need to be involved more so in after school programs and a play-academic performance record.

Yea the Simon Mall will own north Katy.

[westguy76]

Helping the Katy Area

Current Problems:

1.Social Gap ocurring, that in the future may result in in a conflict between North Katy, and South Katy.

Like a civil war? a paintball war? A race war? I am just trying to invision what kind of conflict you percieve.

I don't think there is any way to stop the type of "migration" you speak of. If you are concerned about the area you live in ther may not be much more you can do than move. I just don't know how you could encourage upscale development where you want it.

there is and has been for a long time an economic divide along I-10 all the way into town to 610 or farther. The Energy corridor was a big contributor to the housing growing where it did and the demand for quality housing developments.

[MortgagePIG]

Like a civil war? a paintball war? A race war? I am just trying to invision what kind of conflict you percieve.

I don't think there is any way to stop the type of "migration" you speak of. If you are concerned about the area you live in ther may not be much more you can do than move. I just don't know how you could encourage upscale development where you want it.

there is and has been for a long time an economic divide along I-10 all the way into town to 610 or farther. The Energy corridor was a big contributor to the housing growing where it did and the demand for quality housing developments.

I agree - this is just a reflection of the division of I-10 North and South conintuing West. Looking at the Memorial City Mall area, Memorial has been able to maintain it's value even with the direct North side of I-10 being, for the most part, "ghetto".

What is worisome to me is the building of lower income homes on the South side.

[mrfootball]

Its interesting to see the Katy perspective of the world. Our communities (Katy & Cypress) abut each other but are both separated by the 529 to I-10 zone that nobody seems to want to claim. On the other side (north) of 529 it goes upmarket again as you get closer to Cypress.

Demographic Map for North & West Houston

North & West Houston Demographic Map

BTW, it's not noted on the map, but that corridor where Bridgelands is located (the big blank area on the map along Fry Rd. 290 to 529) is going to have some very solid demographics. If you've not driven through there lately, there are hundreds and hundreds of $300K-$400K homes, with thousands more going in.

Edited April 1, 2007 by mrfootball

[Trae]

I think some of the communities along Barker Cypress are considered good (with the tall trees). I think Cypress starts around Clay Rd (from Mason to Highway 6).

[hbcu]

simple logic...

anytime a middle class/afflient area sits next to a minority area that shares access (streets, rail, etc.) the people in the minority area will move in eventually...

Look...30 years ago..Humble ISD, Aldine ISD, FBISD, Spring Branch ISD, North Forest ISD, Alief, etc. grew because of the people leaving HISD....when minorities in HISD began to move out to those districts, Spring ISD, Katy ISD, Lamar Consolidated, Conroe ISD, Katy ISD, etc. began to grow and are experiencing the next wave of people moving...

eventually, the districts in the last paragraph will change and you'll see another "great" migration....it's sad people like to run but that's the way some folks deal with problems

go back to older schools in HISD, North Forest, etc. and you'll see the first graduates of those schools look way different than they do now...

[westguy76]

All the schools lookd different 30 years ago.

and people are moving into different classes of housing than they were 30 years ago. if an affluent area maintains its values or appreciates then po-folk can't move in. all areas are different it's hard to generalize and say any area with a mixed crowd will go to ship.

[hbcu]

but the suburbs ain't River Oaks....as long as KB Homes and others can sneak in those small homes in areas people will get in...

I've been around long enough to see HISD, FBISD, Aldine ISD, SBISD, Alief ISD, etc. change overnight....where do you go from there?

[westguy76]

but the suburbs ain't River Oaks....as long as KB Homes and others can sneak in those small homes in areas people will get in...

I've been around long enough to see HISD, FBISD, Aldine ISD, SBISD, Alief ISD, etc. change overnight....where do you go from there?

thats why its important to some who value this kind of thing to research an area before they buy. over 8000 homes have now sold in cinco ranch. one would be hard pressed to find a home here for less than 150,000. most sections have nothing less than 180,000. if i had to guess an average it would be in the 250,000 range?? surrounding cinco ranch in the south katy are Kelliwood, grand lakes, seven meadows, among others. these neighborhoods cost more to get in. unless i am wrong, all of these areas are zoned to either cinco ranch hgih school or seven lakes. these are pretty affluent schools. that is what this thread is about there is cheaper housing being built on the north side of I-10 where there are/where more segmented smaller tracts of land. there is also some very nice housing there too. I think the divide has already been created. I don;t know what we could do to help it? assuming one wanted to help.

[cla]

thats why its important to some who value this kind of thing to research an area before they buy. over 8000 homes have now sold in cinco ranch. one would be hard pressed to find a home here for less than 150,000. most sections have nothing less than 180,000.

The very few homes you find in Cinco and like areas for $150,000 are 10 years old, without the amenities and upgrades you find in newer homes. Anyone looking for a new home today in Cinco/Seven Meadows/Grand Lakes etc, better look at spending $200K+.

This being said, at the moment CRHS and SLHS sit amongst some of the higher price/sq ft homes today, but if the trend of older homes being bypassed in favor of new construction continues, where will CRHS and SLHS be 20 years from now?

This concept of newer homes being more valuable than old is new to me - I am from the N.O. area - and new construction is a rare thing - most people buy resell homes. The youngest home I lived in was 40ish and the oldest 120ish. No less desirable because of it's age or lack of "upgrades". Kind of makes me worry that my home will not appreciate in value as much as i would like :-(

[mumbles]

I live in the ghetto north of I-10 near fry and clay road. I see lots of home building going on. With builders buying up land and building expensive townhomes near town, property values are going up and people are being taxed out of their homes. They have to move to the suburbs.

I'm starting to see apartment complexes being built in the area, that is scary. A look at crime stats cleary shows more crime at apartment complexes. With the subprime lending crisis, home sales are expected to drop and apartment rentals are expected to rise. You ain't seen nothing yet!

I remember the last time they went crazy building out here, over building and then the massive amounts of foreclosures. House prices dropped to less than 50% of their original sales price. Investors come in and buy houses to rent out.

The HOA says my neighborhood is now close to 50% hispanic. Crime stats show nothing goes on here, its a nice quiet neighborhood. Problem is it does sometimes look like a parking lot with multi-families living in one home.

I don't see any wars between the north and south breaking out anytime soon.

If you want to stop crime you have to get rid of poverty. Cut property taxes on people who make under 30grand a year so they can afford to fix their homes. Pay them more than the least you can get by with.

As long as there is poverty there will be crime and you can't keep all the poor people in one part of town and just avoid it.

quote name='ekarl17' date='Sunday, March 25th, 2007 @ 2:11pm' post='156531']

Helping the Katy Area

Current Problems:

1.Social Gap ocurring, that in the future may result in in a conflict between North Katy, and South Katy.

2.Development is ocurring mostly in South Katy

3.This fact, makes North Katy less valuable

4.Low income people coming to North Katy, which makes "Katy" less desirable no matter where you live, either north or south. People from Alief ISD and Houston ISD "ghetto" say they live in Katy which makes outsiders think that Katy is a bad area.

5.This people will make our schools be low performance schools, as the ones where they came from

6."they think they move into a nice area, but they are the ones who in less than 10 years will make this area as the one where they came from"

7.We need to encourage more fancy development for middle and high class folks in north katy and south katy

8.This new development will make the katy area more undesirable for low performance students to come

9.Encouraging development like "The Grand Mall", "Memorial Hermann Katy Hospital", Grand Parkway to 290, high-end anchors

10.Then Katy, will be a nice place to live, and work.

What do you think, is this true? Please give opinions to the public, and encourage developers to build more subdivisions in north katy and south katy.

[westguy76]

The very few homes you find in Cinco and like areas for $150,000 are 10 years old, without the amenities and upgrades you find in newer homes. Anyone looking for a new home today in Cinco/Seven Meadows/Grand Lakes etc, better look at spending $200K+.

This being said, at the moment CRHS and SLHS sit amongst some of the higher price/sq ft homes today, but if the trend of older homes being bypassed in favor of new construction continues, where will CRHS and SLHS be 20 years from now?

This concept of newer homes being more valuable than old is new to me - I am from the N.O. area - and new construction is a rare thing - most people buy resell homes. The youngest home I lived in was 40ish and the oldest 120ish. No less desirable because of it's age or lack of "upgrades". Kind of makes me worry that my home will not appreciate in value as much as i would like :-(

2 years ago I bought my house in Cinco. It paid somewhere around 165,000. It was 5 years old. I don't really understand what you mean about having less amenities? or upgrades in a previously owned house. I do my own upgrades rather than pay builder adjusted prices for the same work. That being said my home is only 7 years old. So there have been no technological/ builder material advances that make my house obsolete. At the time to buy a comprable home in cinco ranch west or seven meadows (square footage/build quality) i would have had to pay at least 180,000 probably 190,000. when the area is completely built out in another couple of years the trend towards buying new will have to reverse and that does not mean home values will go to shite.

[Trae]

I live in the ghetto north of I-10 near fry and clay road. I see lots of home building going on. With builders buying up land and building expensive townhomes near town, property values are going up and people are being taxed out of their homes. They have to move to the suburbs.

I'm starting to see apartment complexes being built in the area, that is scary. A look at crime stats cleary shows more crime at apartment complexes. With the subprime lending crisis, home sales are expected to drop and apartment rentals are expected to rise. You ain't seen nothing yet!

I remember the last time they went crazy building out here, over building and then the massive amounts of foreclosures. House prices dropped to less than 50% of their original sales price. Investors come in and buy houses to rent out.

The HOA says my neighborhood is now close to 50% hispanic. Crime stats show nothing goes on here, its a nice quiet neighborhood. Problem is it does sometimes look like a parking lot with multi-families living in one home.

I don't see any wars between the north and south breaking out anytime soon.

If you want to stop crime you have to get rid of poverty. Cut property taxes on people who make under 30grand a year so they can afford to fix their homes. Pay them more than the least you can get by with.

As long as there is poverty there will be crime and you can't keep all the poor people in one part of town and just avoid it.

What apartments? The newest ones I have seen is that Senior Retirement Home on Saums Road just before you get to Fry Road. If there are more going up (north of Clay), then they must be in Cy-Fair's district. The area drops in value the farther east you get of Fry Road, but west of it, it isn't too bad. The homes aren't real cheap quality, either.

[mumbles]

I see some going up on Barker Cypress south of Clay. Not sure what they are building on Greenhouse but I see this barrier going down the middle of them. Apts, duplexes, townhomes? I dont know but they are not single family homes.

What do you think will become of Lakeville? I think it could easily become a slum in a few years.

[Trae]

Lakeville is a dump, but it is in Cy-Fair ISD.

[TJones]

Call your Congressman, and make them aware of your worries and observations.

[mumbles]

LAKEVILLE has obtained numerous local, state and national awards for home design. So where do they get this stuff? You can look at the outside and see it is so cheaply built it will look like cr@p in a few years.

Lakeville is a dump, but it is in Cy-Fair ISD.

[hbcu]

I drove through that one day and laughed at the quality.....who in the hell would buy that? No way I can see those homes ever increasing in value...my old house is 30 years old and runs circles around that crap...

Another laugher is the trailer park across from Cy-Springs on Fry and 529.....I don't exactly think the area was ready for the growth at one time so they build around them

[cla]

2 years ago I bought my house in Cinco. It paid somewhere around 165,000. It was 5 years old. I don't really understand what you mean about having less amenities? or upgrades in a previously owned house. I do my own upgrades rather than pay builder adjusted prices for the same work. That being said my home is only 7 years old. So there have been no technological/ builder material advances that make my house obsolete. At the time to buy a comprable home in cinco ranch west or seven meadows (square footage/build quality) i would have had to pay at least 180,000 probably 190,000. when the area is completely built out in another couple of years the trend towards buying new will have to reverse and that does not mean home values will go to shite.

I was responding to someone's statement that you can get a home in Cinco for $150K. I said that the few homes in Cinco for $150k are 10 years old and don't have the amenities you find in homes being built today. I have been looking at resell homes almost daily on har.com since September 2005. Many of the older homes in Cinco and similar areas that I looked at in the $150K to $175K did not have granite countertops, which is a standard in all of the new homes being built in Cinco today. Most of the homeowners who didn't include those amenities did not add them later, as you are doing.

I did not say anything about property values going to ____, but people wanting to buy new does concern me. Cinco may be built out in a couple of years, but there are more and more communities being built in Katy and other areas. And many people do want a new home so that they can get what they want. I know several people whose homes have been on the market for a time now, while new homes are being sold like crazy in the area. I originally intended on buying a resell house. But after a year and a half of searching, I realized if I bought a resell house, I would spend a fortune in remodeling, because I could not find a floorplan I like with all of the features I wanted and you don't want to get into a neighborhood where most of the homes have laminate c-tops, builder white cabinets, older style white ceramic tile, etc and replace all of that with higher end cabinetry, granite, new tile, etc, because you will not get the full return on your investment. If you spend $50K on remodeling and try to add that on to the price of house in a neighborhood whose homes are priced $50K lower, you will not sell your house.

Edited April 7, 2007 by cla

[Trae]

LAKEVILLE has obtained numerous local, state and national awards for home design. So where do they get this stuff? You can look at the outside and see it is so cheaply built it will look like cr@p in a few years.

Neighborhood layout is fine. Homes, not so much.

[cea610]

There are some nice areas on both N & S sides of the freeway. The south side has some areas that are in as bad a decline as the north...around Mason Rd. you'll find some justifiably inexpensive housing. There are some blighted neighborhoods on both sides of I-10...N & S can't be the dividing line, albeit, more of what some folks call upscale is on the south. The Katy area is hard to define, the city of Katy is not. You can move into the city limits (mostly north of I-10) and buy a home...ranging from a $95K bungalow to a multi-million dollar estate. The nice thing about the city is that it is not so much defined by neighborhoods - on my street houses range from the mid 100's to over a million....all blending very nicely on well shaded large lots...I don't think the problem areas detract from those that have real value, and wouldn't worry about what's going on on the other side of the freeway.