Seeking growing markets in Texas

[Kate Lee]

Howdy - I'm an investor from California, looking to buy a mobile home park in Texas.  There's a direct flight from Santa Barbara, CA to Dallas, TX, which allows me to invest out of state.  Question to all you good-lookin' Texans... can you please tell me what are the best, growing markets, ideally with 100K population, that's within 5 hours driving distance from Dallas?  Thanks so much!

[Brandon Stewart]

I am going to disagree on two parts. 

Energy is the biggest sector in Texas but I do not think it is as volatile as other places. We are not subject to federal gas lease revocation at the whim of the administration. We have no federal land. 

The second largest sector comes in real estate and leasing. I would not suggest purchasing in the largest metroplex areas (Austin, DFW Houston, etc) have seen enormous growth and price increases in the housing markets. 

Texas' population has increased 43% in the last 20 years. About half of Texas's population gain since 2000 resulted from natural increase (more births than deaths); around 29% from net domestic migration gains; and 22% from net international migration gains

Anecdotal experience in the Amarillo area has been that smaller towns are on the rebound. They are seeing an influx of domestic migration because the drive time is not unlike those in larger cities with much shorter commutes and the small-town life is attractive. 

My suggestion would be to look at Amarillo and Lubbock. We have steady growth and low unemployment, and more than 5000+ jobs will be created over the next 3 years in the Amarillo area across all sectors including highly skilled and service-level jobs.