Moving to Fort Hood, TX

[Junior Mendoza]

Hi, I am a newbie a this forum, but I have always read them seeking advice and knowledge. Our family is a military family, that will be moved to Fort Hood, TX at the beginning of next year. We have always been interested in investing for our future by buying and holding properties whenever the Army moves us to a new place every few years. We already own a property that we plan to rent out, after we have moved to Texas. So here are a few question for those of you familiar with the real estate market near Fort Hood (specially Harker Heights, which seems to be the nicer area with better schools and still close to the base):

1. It worries us that Killeen, Harker Heights, Copperas Cove are quite small towns that seem to be solely dependent on Fort Hood, TX staying up and running. What are your thoughts on this?

2. What is the re-sale value of properties on the Harker Heights area? 

3. How is the rental market there? Do landlords tend to get a lot of vacant months?

Any information and advice would be truly appreciated. Thanks!

[Brian Adams]

1. Killeen is actually the largest town between Austin and Dallas - larger than Waco, Temple, Round Rock, Georgetown, all of them. That said, yes, it is still very much a military town. Fort Hood is America's largest military post by population in the world. It is not going anywhere. The down sizing was announced already and added up to about 3500 Soldiers for Fort Hood, to be complete by 2017. The market has begun to diversify some with a large military retiree population and related hospital and healthcare services/jobs, as well as the new and expanding Texas A&M campus. Any area has risks, but a market downturn in our area won't be because of Fort Hood up and running. 

2. I'm not entirely sure what you are asking. Harker Heights is a more expensive market. The median non-builder/foreclosure home sold in 2nd Quarter of 2016 was $187,000, versus $134,800 for the Fort Hood market as a whole. Only Salado has a pricier market (I don't include Belton/Temple and don't know those markets well). Days on market were 37, shorter than the 43 median for the entire Fort Hood area, so it is definitely a good market to be in. That said, you will still want to be particular about what kind of home you buy with an eye on resale/rental. 4/2/2s is what I would focus on.

http://www.hoodhomesblog.com/market/blog/fort-hood...

3. I have an article I recently wrote on the rental market update and what kind of vacancy landlords are seeing in between tenants. BLUF: about 40 days seems to be the median for those rentals listed on the MLS. It is also very seasonal - in June, rentals are getting filled a month out. In November, good luck.

http://www.hoodhomesblog.com/investing/blog/what-t...

Hopefully the moderators don't block this post - these are just articles I wrote with information and graphics/tables - I'm not selling a product. Linking to this info is easier than copy pasting it all.