Bigger in Texas: State has many of US’ fastest-growing cities via MSNBC.com

There was a time in the early 1990s when Austin, Texas, was the quintessential see-through city, with empty office towers downtown and vacant subdivisions meandering through the surrounding limestone hills.

No longer. Austin realtor Kevin Elliott says buyers are snapping up houses as companies like Apple, Progressive Insurance and Whole Foods add hundreds of jobs and out-of-staters gladly pay up for what, to them, appear to be ridiculously cheap homes.

“My last three listings I’ve had multiple offers, and they sold for either full price or more than full price,” said Elliott, with the Home Resource Group of Keller Williams Realty. “They were all under contract within 48 hours.”

A revived home market is just one side of the boom in Austin, which ranks first on Forbes’ list of America’s Fastest-Growing Cities for the second year in a row. The Austin metropolitan area — including the northern suburb of Round Rock, home to Dell Computer — is expected to have an economic growth rate of 6 percent a year through 2016, according to Moody’s Analytics, more than double the nation as a whole. Apple is likely to sign off soon on plans to build a $304 million operations center that will employ as many as 3,600 people.

As usual, Texas dominates our list of the fastest-growing cities, with Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston and San Antonio all in the top 10. Seven of the top 10 cities are in the South, supporting the idea that low taxes and inexpensive real estate are still drawing jobs and economic activity from other parts of the country.

Read more...Bigger in Texas: State has many of US’ fastest-growing cities via MSNBC.com