Companies, condos find Austin a place to call home
By Kathy Warbelow
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Sunday, July 22, 2007
From condo towers rising downtown to unusual shopping centers in North Austin and massive new semiconductor plants on the east side, Austin is changing fast. Its skyline is expanding; its economy is growing and diversifying and its population is increasing, with a steady stream of newcomers drawn to the area's high quality of life and availability of good jobs.
High-tech remains the region's major private employment sector. Leading companies such as Dell Inc. and Advanced Micro Devices have added hundreds of jobs in the past year; Samsung recently dedicated its second Austin semiconductor factory, a sprawling 1.6 million-square-foot facility that will add 900 jobs.
But Austin is more than high-tech. Its retail sector is booming, with the arrival in the past year of IKEA in Round Rock, Neiman Marcus and other upscale stores at the Domain in North Austin, and other mainline retailers at Southpark Meadows, the biggest retail center in South Austin.
The 500-room Hyatt Lost Pines Resort, in Bastrop, is the vanguard of a new wave of hotels headed for Austin in the next two to three years. They will include a W hotel near City Hall; two Marriotts, totaling 1,000 rooms, on Congress Avenue, the boutique Hotel Van Zandt on Town Lake and a Westin and Starwood Aloft in North Austin.
One factor helping grow the region's economy is arrivals from California — both people and companies. Just two recent examples: Dimensional Fund Advisors, a major institutional money management firm, is moving its headquarters from Santa Monica to Austin. Borland Software also moved its headquarters from Silicon Valley, where it was founded, to Austin.
In the past three years, the Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce says a quarter of the companies that have relocated or expanded in Central Texas have come from California.
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Ronnie Bredahl, Austin Realtor
Real Estate Broker
4802 Woodside Drive
Austin, Texas 78735
info@austinreferralrealty.com
Telephone: (512) 785-9050
