I spent a few months in Austin for the first time this year. I hadn't expected much from it, but by the time I had left it had grown on me. I loved that it still had 24-hr coffee shops, I couldn't even find those in Seattle this summer. I also met a bunch of really kind, fun, and ambitious people in my age group (30s) through board groups, including other people interested in founding startups. Overall, it's definitely way more exciting than Raleigh, and the music scene was great too. I think it will continue to attract talent, especially from tech/startup-oriented southerners who may not feel culturally at home on the West Coast. The only other southern city I've organically ran into founders was Nashville, which is nice, but also quite expensive and doesn't have the history of tech investment that Austin does.
> 24-hr coffee shops, I couldn't even find those in Seattle this summer
In Seattle? If New York is the city that never sleeps, Seattle is the tiny city with a narcolepsy approaching that of the twin cities. With the exception of a few restaurants, only the bars are open late nights and they all close by 2 am.
Durham is more exciting than Raleigh . That said I have found the Raleigh-Durham area a nice antidote to be in tech and not be in a hyper competitive, hustling , aggressive environment. There are a bunch of tech, pharma companies and universities which make the culture more research oriented and a little bit of what tier 1 tech cities were pre 2010. Personally I moved from the west coast after burning out and I have found the slower pace nicer but also enough tech opportunities to just continue as a programmer and not want to suddenly become a yogi or venture capitalist or reinvent myself as a farmer .
Lived and worked in Austin tech 7 years. This article is all about startup funding, plus it quotes one unicorn whose home base / frame of reference was Houston, not another tech hub.
Austin was always a great place to build a tech career if you, for example, had a family. The talent pool is great but, in my experience, has a lower risk tolerance (read: prefers bigger and more established companies) than SF. So if you're evaluating by startup formation or funding, sure, the Bay was and remains in the lead. And as that stuff dries up, it's going to dry up faster in Austin, because the culture in Austin always had a slant toward optimization over disruption.
For the big SF/Seattle-based companies, Austin seems like a cheap second city. For a Houston-based startup, Austin seems like an expensive second location. And for a new startup trying to take risks and go big, the Bay is just set up better for it.
I don't see this as losing a luster. I see it as... very little change at all.
My question too. Having lived in Seattle it seems like every time tech boomed there were stories about it becoming the next SV and every time there was a general tech recession there were stories about how it had failed to become the next SV. This article seems very anecdotal and some of the anecdotes contradict each other: Austin has become too crowded and expensive, so companies are moving back to California; Austin doesn’t have a big enough “scene”, so one company is moving to Tulsa?
Yes? Isn’t that implied by “losing its luster,” considering the publisher and audience of the article? I think it goes on to talk about the relationship to venture capital and local govt. so it’s more than a general thing?
Its funny to see govt falling all over itself to regulate crypto but crypto got nothing over the biggest ponzi scheme of all time that they themselves created called 'the us housing market'. Tons of ppl in know in austin, dallas area have like dozen houses where they are now partial owners. Most of those draw rentals less than the monthly mortgage but ppl buying them regardless because "housing always goes up/govt will never let housing fall" .
Which is why government should break their own scheme by building houses and selling them at-cost, or even subsidized (i.e., no-interest mortgage).
I'll fully admit that I've been radicalized by an adulthood of housing insecurity, and I no longer care about housing as an investment or even a market. The current system is cruel, and while I understand that it can never be perfect, the ease with which people's stable shelter can be ripped from them is appalling. Yes, even with eviction and foreclosure proceedings. There are many who would object vociferously to this because their own stability is based on housing's scarcity and inflated value, and while that may be a reality whose collapse we'd have to contend with, I have to think that anyone of good moral thought would recognize the fundamentally perverse nature of the status quo.
Complaints about the weather and then moving operations to Houston? I’ve lived in both cities and Houston is much worse for weather.
I just looked at new home price in Austin though and it’s $2m for 4k square foot house. That seems like a bad idea but there’s plenty of people out there willing to risk going underwater. Houston housing is still much cheaper.
> I just looked at new home price in Austin though and it’s $2m for 4k square foot house. That seems like a bad idea
The old saying "don't buy the biggest house in the street" still rings true.
Austin's median home size is 1800-2000 sqft.
Unless you are looking to house a lot of people (i.e. a big extended family) a 4k sqft house is usually a bad idea from an investment perspective because, should you ever want to sell, the pool of potential buyers interested in a house that large is smaller.
I dunno. From Austin but also lived in Houston. The weather sucks in both places from May-October. But in the cool half of the year, Houston is much more consistent with mild and sunny weather, while Austin gets gray a lot and has more cold snaps. But most importantly, Houston doesn’t have cedar fever.
Fort Worth is not a hip microcosm of California in Texas but it is about to leave Austin in the dust. They have been growing at similar rates for about the last 20 years but Austin is slowing down and growth in Fort Worth continues to accelerate. Fort Worth is scheduled to be the first to reach 1 million residents out of Jacksonville, Austin, Seattle, and San Jose.
If you ignore the non-numerical trend nonsense the writing has been on the wall for more than 5 years based on raw data commonly available to everyone.
DFW doesn't have a concentrated enough operator scene. Tech isn't just software, it's also sales, PM, marketing, pricing, VCs, etc. And that doesn't exist in DFW or Houston.
If you said Richardson or Plano, it might be understandable due to the Telco industry and UTD, but Ft Worth just doesn't have it.
The "1 million residents" is based on arbitrary administrative boundaries within a single metropolitan area. San Francisco also has < 1 million people when measured this way. It is also weird to put San Jose on the list since it is the main city of literal Silicon Valley.
Except for Jacksonville, all of those other cities dwarf DFW in venture capital investment, which is a much more relevant metric than population.
The article cites a few data points for "Austin losing its luster":
- Techstars pausing their Austin tech accelerator and venture funding being down 46%. This is the most compelling data point in the article, however venture funding is down 48% globally [0], so this has nothing to do with Austin specifically.
- A startup moving its HQ from Austin to Houston (where they previously were before moving to Austin), specifically because it is looking for non-software talent that they believe will be more plentiful in Houston.
- A laundry company that has ~10 employees moving from Austin to Tulsa
- An "online travel agency aimed at Millenials" with ~10 employees moving to Sacramento
Meanwhile, companies like Google, Apple, Amazon, Oracle have some of their largest office locations in Austin and show no signs of slowing down, as far as I can tell. This is definitely a new side of Austin, which used to be known for smaller tech startups and didn't have these giant behemoths - so I'll agree that it's losing luster in that way, if that's what is being looked at.
I mean no disrespect towards the company's listed in the article, but I'll wait to make conclusions until there's better data points than a few random companies I've never heard of moving.
Devil's advocate - a couple years ago Google ATX was much heavier on the sales/customer success side than on dev, and I think Amazon ATX was originally started to help jumpstart the graviton project via Annapurna Labs. That said, I agree the article isn't the most convincing.
> moving from Austin to Tulsa
Don't shit on Tulsa. It's basically like Austin in the 90s and 2000s but without STEM and with better BBQ. Most of the hipster artists got priced out there
I mean, the whole deal in Austin was that it was super cheap, and for a super cheap town it was kinda interesting and had a funky vibe.
Now it’s very expensive while still far behind other major cities in quality of life and cultural amenities. Not a good deal anymore.
Relatedly, the funky vibe is going away as it was largely generated by interesting people living there and doing things that didn’t necessarily pay that well but worked when space was super cheap. And once you lose the community it’s really hard to get it back.
>During the COVID-19 pandemic, investors and startup founders alike flocked to the Texas capital
Wasn't this mainly a number of Silicon Valley transplants?
That would be like a number of Houston energy technology growth enthusiasts moving to Sacramento to be right where the action is in the middle of the California software entrepreneur ecosystem.
Given the perceived state of the economy and housing prices/interest- sure. As others pointed out... if you have ever lived any of these mid-market cities, this is a cycle that tracks to SV... I think we saw an increase during COVID thanks to remote... but just like everything during covid, castle made of sand.
My co-worker (remote) lives in Austin and he says he’s more out because it’s basically becoming too commercial and unaffordable. I noticed that he’s also having a child soon, I feel like this is the classic urban paradox, young people like towns for young people.
Did it ever have a luster? It always seemed sort of overhyped and underwhelming to me. And now it is super expensive and is an island in an insane state.
[+] [-] sudosteph|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] peanuty1|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] drewcoo|2 years ago|reply
In Seattle? If New York is the city that never sleeps, Seattle is the tiny city with a narcolepsy approaching that of the twin cities. With the exception of a few restaurants, only the bars are open late nights and they all close by 2 am.
[+] [-] nus07|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] yieldcrv|2 years ago|reply
everything you like is in the densely populated tier 1 cities
fly over, it’s an objective crowded trade for a reason
[+] [-] surge|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mitchellst|2 years ago|reply
Lived and worked in Austin tech 7 years. This article is all about startup funding, plus it quotes one unicorn whose home base / frame of reference was Houston, not another tech hub.
Austin was always a great place to build a tech career if you, for example, had a family. The talent pool is great but, in my experience, has a lower risk tolerance (read: prefers bigger and more established companies) than SF. So if you're evaluating by startup formation or funding, sure, the Bay was and remains in the lead. And as that stuff dries up, it's going to dry up faster in Austin, because the culture in Austin always had a slant toward optimization over disruption.
For the big SF/Seattle-based companies, Austin seems like a cheap second city. For a Houston-based startup, Austin seems like an expensive second location. And for a new startup trying to take risks and go big, the Bay is just set up better for it.
I don't see this as losing a luster. I see it as... very little change at all.
[+] [-] johngossman|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] awill88|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] apwell23|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tipsydoo|2 years ago|reply
I'll fully admit that I've been radicalized by an adulthood of housing insecurity, and I no longer care about housing as an investment or even a market. The current system is cruel, and while I understand that it can never be perfect, the ease with which people's stable shelter can be ripped from them is appalling. Yes, even with eviction and foreclosure proceedings. There are many who would object vociferously to this because their own stability is based on housing's scarcity and inflated value, and while that may be a reality whose collapse we'd have to contend with, I have to think that anyone of good moral thought would recognize the fundamentally perverse nature of the status quo.
[+] [-] croes|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Pigalowda|2 years ago|reply
I just looked at new home price in Austin though and it’s $2m for 4k square foot house. That seems like a bad idea but there’s plenty of people out there willing to risk going underwater. Houston housing is still much cheaper.
[+] [-] danans|2 years ago|reply
The old saying "don't buy the biggest house in the street" still rings true.
Austin's median home size is 1800-2000 sqft.
Unless you are looking to house a lot of people (i.e. a big extended family) a 4k sqft house is usually a bad idea from an investment perspective because, should you ever want to sell, the pool of potential buyers interested in a house that large is smaller.
That's true whether in Austin or Houston.
[+] [-] burlesona|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] austin-cheney|2 years ago|reply
If you ignore the non-numerical trend nonsense the writing has been on the wall for more than 5 years based on raw data commonly available to everyone.
[+] [-] alephnerd|2 years ago|reply
Overall as a city, most likely.
As a tech hub in TX? Absolutely not.
DFW doesn't have a concentrated enough operator scene. Tech isn't just software, it's also sales, PM, marketing, pricing, VCs, etc. And that doesn't exist in DFW or Houston.
If you said Richardson or Plano, it might be understandable due to the Telco industry and UTD, but Ft Worth just doesn't have it.
[+] [-] jandrewrogers|2 years ago|reply
Except for Jacksonville, all of those other cities dwarf DFW in venture capital investment, which is a much more relevant metric than population.
[+] [-] almost_usual|2 years ago|reply
San Jose had over 1 million residents in 2020, the population declined.
[+] [-] easton|2 years ago|reply
(They have really, really good pie if you're in the metroplex. I go every time I visit family there.)
[+] [-] arrakeenrevived|2 years ago|reply
- Techstars pausing their Austin tech accelerator and venture funding being down 46%. This is the most compelling data point in the article, however venture funding is down 48% globally [0], so this has nothing to do with Austin specifically.
- A startup moving its HQ from Austin to Houston (where they previously were before moving to Austin), specifically because it is looking for non-software talent that they believe will be more plentiful in Houston.
- A laundry company that has ~10 employees moving from Austin to Tulsa
- An "online travel agency aimed at Millenials" with ~10 employees moving to Sacramento
Meanwhile, companies like Google, Apple, Amazon, Oracle have some of their largest office locations in Austin and show no signs of slowing down, as far as I can tell. This is definitely a new side of Austin, which used to be known for smaller tech startups and didn't have these giant behemoths - so I'll agree that it's losing luster in that way, if that's what is being looked at.
I mean no disrespect towards the company's listed in the article, but I'll wait to make conclusions until there's better data points than a few random companies I've never heard of moving.
0: https://www.reuters.com/business/finance/venture-capital-fun...
[+] [-] alephnerd|2 years ago|reply
> moving from Austin to Tulsa
Don't shit on Tulsa. It's basically like Austin in the 90s and 2000s but without STEM and with better BBQ. Most of the hipster artists got priced out there
[+] [-] burlesona|2 years ago|reply
Now it’s very expensive while still far behind other major cities in quality of life and cultural amenities. Not a good deal anymore.
Relatedly, the funky vibe is going away as it was largely generated by interesting people living there and doing things that didn’t necessarily pay that well but worked when space was super cheap. And once you lose the community it’s really hard to get it back.
[+] [-] mbm|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nunez|2 years ago|reply
1. It's way bigger than Austin
2. It's international airport is a key hub for United and has an expansive route network, including routes to China
3. It's road network has significantly more capacity,
4. It has much better suburban infrastructure, and those suburbs are growing rapidly, and
5. Surprisingly its public transit is better!
Yeah, it's hot and swampy in the summer months, but you're probably inside something air conditioned anyway.
Houston beats Austin hands down every day of the week for me.
[+] [-] foogazi|2 years ago|reply
> Houston beats Austin hands down every day of the week for me.
Never hear much about the Houston startup scene - is this real or imagined ?
[+] [-] unknown|2 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] fuzzfactor|2 years ago|reply
Wasn't this mainly a number of Silicon Valley transplants?
That would be like a number of Houston energy technology growth enthusiasts moving to Sacramento to be right where the action is in the middle of the California software entrepreneur ecosystem.
[+] [-] alephnerd|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] spacecadet|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] apwell23|2 years ago|reply
not the housing market.
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