The wife and I may be moving to Austin after the holidays. Any Evo owners in the Austin area? If so, what are some pro/cons of living in the area? Anything I should know about living in Austin (or Texas for that matter) before I decide to move?

 

I don't actually live in Austin, but i have lived in the central Texas area for almost 10 years now. A couple of things i can tell you about the area is that 1. Austin has HORRIBLE traffic. When ever you take trips through CenTex that is one thing that is known well to everyone. Also the cost of living in this area is VERY low. The housing market is great here to buy a house.

 

Thanks for the tip on the traffic. I figured with the amount of large cities in Central Texas traffic would be bad. We have been looking online at some houses and found some awesome deals for really nice houses so it is nice for that to be confirmed.

 

Yea no doubt, i live in San Antonio and our traffic is bad also. Just don't be on the roads between 4pm-6pm on work days and its bearable.

 

I moved to Dallas from Minneapolis about 2 years ago and I love it. I'm sure you'll feel the same about Austin. Great things about Texas are no state income tax and incredibly low cost of living/housing.

I also like the roads here. For the most part, they're in really nice shape compared to other areas of the country. Traffic on the tollways was also better than I experienced living in Minneapolis.

 

Austin is a great town. If you're into rally there is a driving school supposedly opening up soon (rally ready) and a dirt track in San Marcos (search Facebook rally Texas).

 

Lots of good info so far.

No state income tax would be awesome as I currently enjoy that in Florida. Kracka does Texas charge lots of fees when registering cars? I'm wondering because FL charges a huge fee the first time you register a car in the state.

Also saw that there is a high performance driving course in Austin as well that I would love to take the Evo on. Anyone know anything about it?

Here is the site:
http://www.drivewayaustin.com/driving-school/overview

 

No, quite a bit cheaper here than it was in MN. I think we pay about $100/year for annual inspection and registration when it was nearly $400/year in MN.

 

Traffic isn't that bad. 15 mind north to south austin, 30 with worst traffic, way better than houston, san antonio, dallas, etc.

Tons if great beer in austin, awesome music, killer eating, lake when there isn't such a drought, huge personality diversity.

 

Another awsome thing about this area is the fact that you have San Antonio, Houston and Dallas within a 4 hour radius (SA about a hour and a half, Houston about 3 and Dallas about 4)

 

Inspection eh? What's involved in that?

 

F1 race will be this time next year, don't miss it ...

 

They plug in an OBD tester and you pass basically. I pay ~$100 a year for my Evo between registration and inspection. Ecuflash OBD II readiness FTMFW!

 

So emissions inspection? I had to deal with that in Wisconsin. Not too bad in newer cars but sucked in old cars.

 

No, our "emissions" inspection is only OBD and visual... Come on, you are talking about the state that invented drunk driving! (Drunk cowboys heading off into the sunset)