Recommendations for Buying Primary Residence in Houston Area

[Ryan Collins]

Hi All, 

It's been a while since I've been on the site. I'm reaching out to see if any BP'ers are extensively familiar with the Houston market. I just moved down here about 6 months ago (right after Harvey) and I'm currently looking for a new primary residence. I know a decent amount but definitely not enough to say I'm overly confident in this FAST moving market. 

We've found a perfect home in the Rosenberg area with everything we want but from what I'm reading the school systems are just so-so. Although I was just told not to put too much stock in to GreatSchools, SchoolDigger, Niche and others reviews. It's in the Reserves at Brazos/Enclave area.

For whatever reason it seems these homes are moving slow, and potentially having an issue holding value. Nonetheless it's an extremely new area and I'm curious as to if I should make the jump here or raise my price limit and look into other well-established areas with solidified school systems such as Pearland, Katy, the newer areas of Richmond (Long Meadow, Harvest Green...). Some of the reasons I'm considering on making the jump into this area is because they are steadily continuing to develop at a crazy rate, it has good highway access, the neighbors are cool and the location to the shopping center makes it ideal. My drawbacks are that because it's so new it could still be a serious risk in losing money, there's no guarantee the school systems will turn around once built out, and it has high HOA fees. Let me know your thoughts. Anything constructive is appreciated.

Just another little pre-qualifier...I am currently working with a really good realtor but I'm on here asking because I value different perspectives and opinions. Also we're looking for newer builds and aren't interested in renovating because my lady is due soon.