Articles Tagged "Plano"

Plano homes for sale put you right in the middle of one of Texas's great centers of culture and fine arts.

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Want to plan some outings that you and your kids can both enjoy? The DFW is full of family-friendly activities that are entertaining and educational. Our real estate agents love spending quality time with their families at these great spots around the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

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Legacy Food Hall is a favorite among residents around our Plano homes for sale who visit this spot regularly for great food, lively entertainment, and excellent company. In fact, this food hall was mentioned by Taste of Home as one of the Best Food Halls Across the United States.

Legacy Food Hall has been a landmark of downtown Plano since it opened in 2017. The hall opens at 10 AM every day and closes as late as 1 AM on Fridays and Saturdays, though some vendors may keep slightly different hours.  

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It may not be the horse-drawn sleigh of old, but your car serves as a perfect vehicle for seasonal adventures. Our real estate agents can't wait to take in these holiday light displays that are just minutes from Dallas homes for sale.

• Candy Cane Lane - American Airlines Center, 2500 Victory Ave., Dallas, TX 75219
  What "kid" of any age could resist a magical place called Candy Cane Lane? The multi-level display includes lights, lantern characters, and other holiday surprises. Don't forget to get a family photo with Santa Claus. Candy Cane Lane runs through December 26. Visit the website for times. Admission is $35-$50 per vehicle.
  
  
• Dallas Zoo Lights - Dallas Zoo, 650 S.R.L. Thornton Fwy., Dallas, TX 75203
  A beloved holiday tradition takes on a new form at Dallas Zoo Lights. Enjoy the one million lights, 3-D sculptures, and video projection vignettes along the one-mile course from the comfort of your car. Dallas Zoo Lights will be shining through January 2. Visit the website for the full schedule. Admission is $65 per car, $50 for Zoo members, and must be purchased in advance.
  
  
• Radiance! - Riders Field, 7300 Roughriders Trail, Frisco, TX 75034
  Theme parks aren't just for summer. This year's version of Radiance!, a popular holiday attraction down the street from Frisco homes for sale, includes "Frozen in Frisco," a winter carnival with tubing, ice skating, snowball fights, and even a Ferris wheel. Sit back on the Holly Jolly Trolley for a show featuring three million glittering, dancing lights. Tickets range from $19.99-$39.99 per person. Radiance! is open through January 1. Visit the website for dates and times.
  
  
• Interlochen Christmas Lights - Westwood Dr., Arlington, TX 76012
  For more than 40 years, Lake Interlochen has provided the backdrop for a cherished holiday tradition. Interlochen Christmas Lights was the brainchild of community developer Bob Findlay, and today upwards of 200 neighbors deck their homes with spectacular lights and decorations. View the impressive display near Arlington homes for sale from 7 p.m. - 11 p.m. nightly. 
  
  
• Historic Grapevine Christmas Spectacular - Town Square Gazebo, 325 Main St., Grapevine, TX 76051
  Find something old and something new at this year's Historic Grapevine Christmas Spectacular. It's only fitting that the "Christmas Capital of Texas" would offer a stunning display full of lights, life-sized Christmas cards, and an animated snowman. 2021 marks the debut of the outsized Main Street Toyland. Stop by after a day of viewing Grapevine homes for sale. Hours are 9 a.m. - 10 p.m. daily through January 10, and admission is free.
  
  
• Santa House - 3373 Spruce Ln., Grapevine, TX 76051
  Share in the giving spirit of the holidays when you visit Santa House. The Murillo family fills their yard with more than 1,000 brilliantly lit retro Santa figures to create a whimsical display of any child's dreams. Their ultimate goal is raising awareness of and funds for the Christmas Cottage, an organization providing holiday gifts for kids in need. Hours are 5 p.m. - 10 p.m. every day through December 25.
  
  
• Lights on the Farm - Heritage Farmstead Museum, 1900 W. 15th St., Plano, TX 75075
  Experience the charm of an old-fashioned holiday that runs through Lights on the Farm, not far from Plano homes for sale. Walk the quarter-mile trail through trees and displays covered with more than one million lights. Visit Santa's Workshop, where kids can write letters and get their pictures. Lights on the Farm is open beginning at 6 p.m. weekends through December 26. Tickets are $10 for adults and $7 for kids.

Have your own festive light display in your new DFW home. Contact us at RE/MAX DFW Associates to learn more.

When our real estate agents heard that National French Toast Day was coming up on November 28th, they got super excited! There are some great breakfast and brunch places in the Dallas–Fort Worth area, and this gave them a reason to try some of them out. 

Start your morning out right with French toast from these local restaurants. 

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Everything's bigger in Texas, but it looks smaller when seen from the treetops. Ziplining is just one of the outdoor activities that make the Dallas-Fort Worth area such a great place to live. Our real estate agents recommend getting your adrenaline pumping at these exciting parks around the DFW.

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Whether you're permanently working from home or just want a space where you can create in peace, it's important to set up an inviting home office that you look forward to working in. Our real estate agents also find that a home with a home office is more appealing to potential buyers. You don't have to undergo a complete renovation to update your home office; instead, check out these simple ways to give your home office a boost. 

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Mother's Day is fast approaching, and there's no better way to appreciate your mom than treating her to a delicious meal. Start Mother's Day with a memorable brunch at a fantastic local restaurant. Our real estate agents have rounded up some of the most exquisite DFW restaurants where you'll find a delicious treat that your mother will thoroughly enjoy: 

1. Reata Forth Worth—310 Houston Street, Sundance Square, Fort Worth, TX 76102
   Located close to Fort Worth homes for sale, this restaurant is renowned for its sophisticated cowboy cooking and exclusive wine list. Reata Fort Worth offers both private dining and family meals and is a great spot for Texans who are hankering for some mouth-watering food. If your mom is a lover of classic cuisine, she'll undoubtedly enjoy the restaurant's specialty items such as the Tenderloin Tamales or the Pan Seared Pepper Crusted Tenderloin. 
    
2. Pinstripes—5001 Trailhead Bend Way, Fort Worth, TX 76109
   Is there a better way to celebrate your mom than reserving her a spot at Pinstripes on Mother's Day? Pinstripes recently opened patio seating just in time for May 9th. Savor a world-class brunch with mom, washed down with discounted handcrafted cocktails. You can also win a brunch for your mom and the entire family by entering Pinstripes' Mother's Day competition. All you have to do is send a snap of your mom with a short description of what makes her special.
   
   
3. Snooze Eatery—3211 Oak Lawn Ave, Dallas, TX 75219
   This spot prides itself on being the number one breakfast and brunch restaurant near our Dallas homes for sale. Your mom will undoubtedly love Snooze Eatery's laidback attitude, tasty meals, and cozy ambiance. Start with green eggs and ham followed by a special Mother's Day soup or the restaurant's renowned hot and cold sandwiches. If your mom is a wine lover, she'll love the extensive wine list offered at Snooze Eatery. Takeaway services are available on request.
   
   
4. Yolk—8315 Westchester Drive, Dallas, TX 75225
   Treat your mom like the queen she is by reserving her a brunch at Yolk. The restaurant is renowned for its fantastic fusion breakfasts that your mom won't forget. The fresh approach to brunch is what makes the Yolk restaurants stand out. All foods are made from quality ingredients and are incredibly affordable. Thus, you can give your mom a treat without breaking the bank. Special discounts will be offered on Mother's Day, so you should be on the lookout for them.
   
   
5. Del Frisco's Grille—7200 Bishop Road, Suite D9, Plano, TX 75024
   Take a trip to Spain when you treat your mom to a Spanish brunch at Del Frisco's Grille. Here, you'll find seasoned, polished Spanish country cooking that has stood the test of time. Del Frisco's Grille is a favorite brunch spot for many Texans, thanks to its tasty foods, fine wines, and convenient location near Plano homes for sale. The welcoming ambiance at the restaurant allows you to eat, drink, and talk all day.

Do not hesitate to contact our real estate agents to see what we have on offer.

Valentine's Day is right around the corner. If you're looking for a way to impress that special someone, flower deliveries are always a big hit! 

Choosing the right florist can mean the difference between sending a gift that's truly stunning and one that's underwhelming. If you're not sure which florist to choose, you're in luck. Our real estate agents have had the pleasure of working with some of the best in the area. Here are a few of their recommendations. 

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Wouldn't it be nice to live in a city where you can have it all, without breaking the bank? While so many of the most popular cities to call home come with a cost of living that's significantly higher than average, that isn't the case when you live in Plano, TX. Plano offers all of the benefits of the best cities, with an affordable cost of living that makes it easy to enjoy all the city has to offer. Our real estate agents have all the details on the affordable cost of living in Plano and why it's such a great place to call home.

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Whatever else is going on in our lives, Thanksgiving is a constant, providing us with a comforting sense of gratitude. Celebrate in style with a fine-dining feast from one of these upscale restaurants around DFW recommended by our real estate agents. 

• Mignon - 4005 Preston Rd., Suite 518, Plano, TX 75093
  With its intimate booths, Mondrian-style abstract artwork and elegant wood surfaces, dining at Mignon, just minutes from Plano homes for sale, feels like being in a scene from a 1960s French film. The three-course, $54 prix-fixe Thanksgiving menu begins with soup or salad, followed by turkey breast with stuffing, sweet potatoes, green beans, and cranberry relish. For dessert, choose between apple pie and pumpkin cheesecake. Substitute filet mignon or Chilean sea bass for an additional charge. Two private dining rooms for each seating time allow safe social distancing. Hours are 8:45 a.m. - 5 p.m. with a two-hour limit.

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East-West Line thru Plano, Richardson, North Dallas, Addison, Carrollton, Coppell, Cypress Waters, DFW Airport

Completion Date – December 22, 2022

Trains every 20 minutes

The final approved DART Cotton Belt Line from Plano to DFW Airport

The Dallas Area Rapid Transit board on Tuesday approved $872 million to build its first east-west commuter rail line — the Cotton Belt — even though it doesn't have the actual cash quite yet.  DART leaders met with the Build America Bureau in Washington, D.C., last week to confirm that the federal loan that will finance a 26-mile route connecting Plano, Richardson, Addison, North Dallas and DFW International Airport is expected to close Dec. 20.  Within the next few weeks, DART expects to be issued a notice to move forward on the project with its design-build partner, Archer Western Herzog 4.0, which was unanimously awarded an $815 million contract Tuesday night, contingent on the federal loan. The contract will run through Dec. 28, 2022, the anticipated completion date.

It also kept the door open for the board to decide next month whether to spend an additional $90 million to $120 million to add a second track along the line, something the board listed as a preference.  "We've discussed the double-track subject for a couple of years," board member Paul Wageman said. "We're going to have significant savings over what we thought the finance costs were on this."  Cotton Belt was budgeted as a $1.1 billion project.

About half of the project, including the nine rail stations, is double-tracked as currently bid. Though plans are for Cotton Belt to debut as an every-30-minute service, the contract also calls for three more miles to be double-tracked. That would enable enough two-way passing opportunities to allow runs every 20 minutes.  If it doesn't fully double-track the line, the board also has the option to spend $27 million to add a second track to a three-mile area of Far North Dallas, where grade levels and four bridge crossings pose a challenge.

The contract already includes $32 million in "betterments" for neighborhoods lining the route, providing for sound walls, rubber chips to minimize track vibration and other amenities.  The first six to eight months, according to staff presentations, will focus on design of the project. The first signs of progress on the ground will be utility relocation and foundation work for bridges.

The Cotton Belt will also connect to DART's existing light rail system at stops in Carrollton, Plano and Richardson. But it will be a commuter rail line, similar to the Trinity River Express, which DART co-owns with Fort Worth's Trinity Metro and connects downtown Dallas and Fort Worth.

• Dallas Morning News, December 12, 2018

North Texas home sales dropped in September by the largest percentage in more than seven years. Preowned home sales in the area fell by 7 percent from September 2017. That was the biggest year-over-year sales decline since early 2011, according to data from the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University and North Texas Real Estate Information Systems.  Home sales by real estate agents have been down in three of the last four months. Higher mortgage costs and years of rising home prices have caused some buyers to pull back from the market.  Mortgage rates on average are currently about 4.7 percent — the highest level in seven years — and are expected to go higher in 2019.  With September's sales decline, preowned home sales by real estate agents in North Texas are now flat with the same period of 2017. A record of more than 106,000 homes sold in the area last year.  "We think things are going to be flat," said Dr James Gaines, chief economist for the Real Estate Center. The Dallas-Fort Worth housing market has cooled significantly since early in the year when sales were still up by double-digit percentage rates from 2017 levels.

Home price growth has also slowed.  Median home sales prices rose by 4 percent in September from a year earlier to $251,000.  For the first nine months of 2018, prices are up 5 percent from the sale period in 2017. With sales declining, the number of houses on the market in North Texas has growth to 25,895 preowned single-family homes listed with real estate agents at the end of last month. That's 16 percent more homes for sale in the area than a year ago.  On average it took 44 days to sell the houses that trade in September — up 5 percent from a year earlier. Currently there is about a 3-month supply of homes available for purchase in the more than two dozen North Texas counties included in the survey.

• Dallas Morning News, October 9, 2018

"I would expect this somewhat disappointing spring selling season will be a bit of a wake-up call for (North Dallas suburban) home sellers, and they will eventually consider lowering asking prices, which in turn will bring some buyers back to the table," Attom Data economist Daren Blomquist said.

The slowdown in Dallas-Fort Worth's housing market may be worse than at first glance. Sales of preowned single-family homes dropped 1 percent annually in August in all of North Texas, according to the latest numbers from the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University. Those numbers include data on more than two dozen counties stretching from the Red River to Waco. When you drill down in the numbers to just the immediate D-FW area, August's dip in home purchase activity was much larger. In the Dallas area, sales of preowned homes by real estate agents fell by about 4 percent in August from a year earlier. Fort Worth-area sales managed to eke out a 1 percent year-over-year rise in home purchases made through real estate agents. But some Dallas-area residential districts saw marked declines in home buying last month.

Real estate agents say the overall numbers understate the housing sector cooldown. A look at individual neighborhoods gives clearer insight into the state of the market.  Sales last month were down almost 31 percent in Far North Dallas. They dropped 24 percent from August 2017 totals in Allen, and were off 21 percent in Coppell. Plano had a 16 percent year-over-year sales decline and sales were down more than 11 percent in Richardson and about 9 percent lower in Frisco. Not all of North Texas' markets saw the housing market hit the brakes. Sales soared 40 percent in Prosper, for instance, and were 37 percent higher in DeSoto. The pricey Park Cities market had a 29 percent jump in August sales from the previous year.

• Dallas Morning News, September 17, 2018

Is the housing boom running out of gas?  During the last few years, the home market has been on a tear in North Texas and in other parts of the country, with prices soaring and buyers lining up as soon as a sign hits the front yard.  But there are growing signs that the fast-paced housing market is shifting gears, with a decline in sales in many markets and smaller price increases.  In July, U.S. preowned home sales fell from a year ago for the fifth month in a row. And nationwide new home sales were down almost 2 percent in July, causing analysts at IHS Markit to question if the bull home market has turned bearish.  "The economy is strong. Labor markets are solid. Yet, new home sales and single-family housing starts and permits have stalled. How can this be?" said Patrick Newport, executive director of the U.S. economics team at IHS.

Newport said rising home prices and higher mortgage rates have cooled the ardor for home buying.  "This has choked off demand," he said. A slowdown in immigration and household formation could also be factors, Newport theorizes.  In North Texas, year-over-year preowned home sales have fallen in many neighborhoods, and for the entire region, year-to-date sales were up a measly 2 percent as of July.  At the same time, the double-digit percentage home price gains of the last few years have faded in Dallas-Fort Worth. Through the first seven months of 2018, median home sales prices were up only 6 percent from the same period last year, according to sales data from real estate agents.

Property agents say that some first-time buyers have given up after losing out to other buyers or all-cash investors who snapped up affordable homes.  At midyear, the number of prospective U.S. homebuyers who said they planned to make a purchase in the next 12 months fell to just 14 percent — down from 24 percent in fourth quarter of 2017, according to the National Association of Home Builders. That's still another sign that the home market — while not in a traditional bubble — may be headed for slower sales in the year ahead.  "It's clear that the winds that have boosted sellers over the past few years are ever-so-slightly starting to shift," said Zillow senior economist Aaron Terrazas.

• Dallas Morning News, August 27, 2018

Dallas-Fort Worth was one of the top destinations for domestic migrants from California in 2017, according to a recent study.  There were 1,051 moves from coastal California, the home of some of the country's toughest housing markets, to Dallas in the first quarter of 2017, according to Alexandra Lee, a housing analyst with the real estate listing and research site Trulia, which did the study.  Out of 19,132 moves out of the region during that time period, 5.5 percent went to D-FW.   Houston is also a popular destination for people fleeing the California coast — 3 percent of the migrants in the study came to Texas' most populous city, meaning that 8.5 percent of those in the study came to either Dallas-Fort Worth or Houston.   The Trulia report looked at census data for transplants from four coastal California hubs: San Francisco, San Jose, Los Angeles and San Diego. Homes in those markets listed for an average of $720,000 in March 2017, Trulia says, compared to $313,000 in Dallas and $250,000 nationally.   The home prices in these cities is clearly a major determinant in whether people leave California and to where they move, Lee said over email, but it's not the be-all and end-all.  Texas is a big destination for job-to-job flows, a U.S. Census Bureau-designed statistic that measures flows of employees from one company to another when they've been at each company longer than three quarters. The biggest source of these flows is California, which contributed 6,884 in the first quarter of 2016.

• Dallas Morning News, June 28, 2018

SOURCE: Estimates from Texas Education Agency

• Dallas Morning News, July 4, 2018 (excerpts)

  *School districts with relatively low enrollment (below 1,500 students)

Coppell and Highland Park Pay the Most Per Capita

Property taxes continue to rise, but increasingly for taxpayers in North Texas, those dollars aren't going to local school districts.  According to estimates from the Texas Education Agency for the 2018-19 school year, 25 D-FW school districts are expected to surrender $539 million back to the state through recapture, the mechanism designed to better balance school funding between "property-rich" and "property-poor" districts.  Statewide, the TEA estimates that 217 school districts will be subject to recapture for the upcoming school year, with $2.69 billion of local property taxes siphoned back to the state.  

In the North Texas area, Coppell and Highland Park school districts send the most to the state per capita, both classified as "property-rich" districts to help pay for the "property-poor" districts around the state, mostly along the Texas border with Mexico.   Interestingly, Frisco ISD has not been classified as a "property-rich" district but that may change as early as next year, in which then millions of tax dollars will be required to be sent to the state.  This will be a financial dilemma for Frisco since the school district has been unable to get voter approval for higher taxes.