:) Looking at Realtor.com in Houston I'm blown away with how much home you get for the same dough. If I moved there, which I'm not planning on, I would follow in your footsteps and downscale (in price) dramatically and invest the remainder elsewhere.

Second this comment. NM is a nice state but not real good if you or the family needs "cultured" events like the opera or theater. If they are used to this ABQ or possibly Santa Fe is the only option, but otherwise the rest of the state is high desert and excellent climate.

North part can be cold as hell but it all depends on what you want.

Scrambled eggs, avocado, onion, cilantro, salt, pepper, hot salsa, all wrapped in a flour tortilla - it's our traditional Sunday breakfast!

I'll have mine with extra bacon, cheese and potatos, hold the avocado and cilantro!

Forgot the grated sharp cheddar. DOH!

BTW, my folks in NJ just listed their main house for sale. It's a big colonial on 2.5 acres and they're asking $590k. Their tax bill is over $8k per year and includes almost no services - no snow removal, no garbage pick up, they have a well/septic, we went to private schools and they are allowed to make two trips per year to the county dump for oil and other oddball recycling.

I don't remember reading exactly what you do in the Restaurant business. Houston is VERY cut throat!!! If you open one up, find something in the burbs, PM me if you have some questions.

Some people make VERY good money with simple restaurants in the middle of no where. There are TONS of small towns near the big cities who need good places to eat. Brenham, College Station, Athens, Corsicana, Texarkana, Tyler, there are just too many neat little (100,000 people or less) towns all over the map.

Taxes are generally very good (about $45.00 per year per car/truck, and $5.00 per year per trailer), no income tax, no personal property tax, generally 8.25% sales tax except of food stuffs and necessities. Our 2800 sqft home on 17 acres was $1800.00 last year, will be the same this year. (Oh, it is for sale at $185K, but I'll give a Pelican discount!! ;-)

In South TX where they originated many many years ago they are called breakfast TACOS, not burritos. In San Antonio and in virtually every town on further south there is a breakfast taco joint on what seems to be every corner.

If you order a burrito it just means you are one of the clueless from Houston, DFW or other points north...... :D

Sorry about that Joe, you did mention SA but mainly Austin.

Don't know what I was thinking. Of course they are breakfast tacos. My burst.

Now, don't get me started on Rudy's chopped beef bbq...would make homer give up donuts.

There are a few places with better BBQ than Rudy's but Rudy's dipping sauce is as good as it gets all right. Whenever we get back to SA we usually stock up with 3 or 4 bottles as we can't get it down here in the boonies.

OK, you got me started.

Brisket: Rudy's
Ribs: county line, salt lick
Turkey: Salt Lick
Sausage: Salt Lick
Cole Slaw: Salt Lick or County Line
Sauce: Rudy's
Chopped: Rudy's

But I know there a lots of smaller places I haven't tried in Austin. Only been here 11 years.

Probably off your beaten path but Coopers BBQ just off IH10 in Junction is primo as is Hinze's BBQ just off US 59 in Wharton.

Being kind of a BBQ junkie, we make it a habit to try and stop at every hole-n-the-wall BBQ joint we run across. You get the good, the bad, and the ugly this way. There does seem to be some correlation between the building and the BBQ - the fancier the building, the worse the BBQ tends to be.

In Mexia, go to Kirby's!!! You will NOT be sorry, if you can find a parking place and get in the door, and are there on a Wed-Sat when they are open...but darn well worth it!!

Its the people that make DFW what it is.:rolleyes:

I've lived in Houston and Dallas, I also choose Houston. To each his own I guess :rolleyes: .

The best summation of living in TX? Back in the 80's a columnist from Boston visited our fair state (SAn Antonio in particular) and upon returning to Boston wrote a column and stated that TX is:

"a hotter than hell, rattlesnake ridden, pickup truck infested, God forsaken place".
the article was rather quickly reprinted in the SA papers followed by an avalanche of letters telling the columnist what they thought of him and his opinion.

However, the absolute best response was a one sentence column by one of the SA papers columnists. The response:

"so what's your point" :D

one more thing ,some places in west Texas don`t check smog pumps, aftermarket stuff, open up the pipes and let er rip. If you are handy you can build a 4000 sq ft house for 80,000, Tornados will only hit you if you are in the way.

We looked over Austin last August.
In 3 days our Realtor drove us over 400 miles on the west side south to north.
I have 2 very good Realtor referrals, lmk.
No one mentioned the wild deer in Austin?
Landscaping must be deer tolerant, or none at all.
Just west of Austin 300/400k up will get you a new or newer 2k sq-ft single story on a half acre.
Really nice home!
Rock 3 sides, 9/10 foot ceilings, great looking homes.
Local property taxes were related to school districts and were around 2.5% to 3.2%.
Austin can get the huge hail, dive under an overpass unless you are stuck in traffic.
Lake Travis was very low when we were there, of some concern too was all the homes dependent on well water.
Everyone was very nice and it was a very enjoyable visit.
On the way out at AUS some locals told us about damage from grapefruit size hail and basically told us not to leave SD.

Come on down to Texas!


Just PLEASE, don't go around acting like Kalifornia was so superior, and that you don't have to learn how to be Texan- that we should be more like Kali. WE HATE THAT CRAP.