10 Biggest Mistakes When Relocating to Austin

Moving to a new county or state is a complex endeavor, especially when you are house hunting from a distance. Mistakes can cost you dearly - in time, money, and sheer frustration. That is why having a solid strategy and personal guidance is paramount.

Introduction

Relocating is a bit like embarking on a new career or saying "I do" - it is a monumental decision that shapes your future. But unlike these life events, few of us have recent relocation experience to guide us through the process.

You can try to tackle relocation on your own, but the cost of mistakes far outweighs the investment in professional assistance. Time wasted is time you can never reclaim, and minimizing drama and emotional scars sets the stage for thriving sooner rather than later.

The Importance of Strategy and Guidance

At Considering Austin, we have identified up to thirty-seven different companies the average family deals with when relocating to another city or state. We have expertise and strategic relationships we leverage to ensure success. Think of us as the managing general partner, quarterback, or symphony conductor for the relocation process.

The following charts show where people are leaving (orange dots) and where they are moving to (blue dots). And below that, state-by-state net migration numbers and percentages.

According to U.S. Census & NAR:

Leaving - Migration out (2022, net)

1. California – 343,200
2. New York – 299,557
3. Illinois- 141,656

Going - Migration in (2022, net)

1. Florida – 318,855
2. Texas – 230,961
3. North Carolina – 99,796

Why Families Relocate

Over 46% of all movers relocated to a different county or state and according to the U.S. Census, more than 8.2 million residents lived in a different state than the year before.

The U.S. Census identified four primary categories for why people relocate or move:

• Housing – 40%
• Family – 25%
• Employment – 20%
• Other – 15%

At Considering Austin, our specialty is helping individuals and families understand the medium- and long-term financial consequences of relocating or not relocating. When your desired lifestyle, plus saving for the future, costs less than your income, you sleep better and look forward to the future with a smile. This is why we created Considering Austin.

Most people in high-cost cities are in the opposite position - expenses exceed income. One of our favorite sayings is: When our outflow exceeds our income, our upkeep becomes our downfall. –Jim Rohn

Relocating families fall into one of three groups:

1. Want to
2. Need to (and they know it)
3. Need to (and they do not know they need to)

The Considering Austin unique six-step process begins with helping people figure out if they are in group one, two, or three. Group three is larger than you would expect. When people subconsciously know things are not right or sustainable, they often do not want to look deeper.

Explore – Decide – Act

Every successful relocation has three components:

1. Do the right things
2. Do them in the right order
3. Do not do wrong things

It is important to learn from your mistakes, but it is better to learn from other people’s mistakes, and it is best to learn from other people’s success. It accelerates your own success. –Jim Rohn

Whether you are moving to Austin, or relocating anywhere, the following list is full of wisdom that can save you time, money, and heartache.

Ten Biggest Mistakes When Relocating to Austin

1.) Not Identifying the Main Things

From not fully assessing your current situation to underestimating the complexity of relocation, the pitfalls are many and they stem from not identifying the main things, including: why are we doing this, and where are we now, is relocating a want or a need, what are the costs and benefits?

Family time, leisure, and vacations often get put off for work or because “life is busy,” and then ten years go by. "If we lived somewhere that was less expensive, would we have more freedom to live and be?" Or, "What if we lived somewhere that was growing, dynamic, and fun; would that get us closer to our dreams?"

These questions encompass ‘main things.’ If these main questions are not asked and answered, everything downstream makes less sense.

2.) Underestimating Scope and Complexity

Relocating to another city often starts by looking at houses on an iPad. People do not realize that up to twenty-five different companies are involved in moving and buying a house. And another twelve more companies are part of getting settled in and thriving.

Success requires more than pen and paper. It requires experience, systems thinking, and continuous improvement. What does it look like when it all goes wrong? We will look at a case study after this list.

3.) Failing to Plan and Execute Each Step

The Considering Austin unique process entails six phases that cover:

1. Taking an inventory of where your life is
2. Reviewing finances and future goals
3. Identifying what is important in a new home and city
4. Shopping for a new home
5. Buying a new or existing home
6. Selling current home, moving, and thriving

Once you understand the importance of each step, and how they each build on the previous step, you’ll see how failing to do something important, or doing the right things but in the wrong order, or doing the wrong things, can significantly increase the cost and the time it takes to go from idea to reality.

4.) Choosing to DIY or Work with the Wrong Partners

We learn two ways: study and experience. Can you think of a time when you did an expensive, complicated project and it worked out right on your first try?

When the cost of failure is high, either in terms of money, time, or frustration, working with the right professional, coach, or company is paramount.

5.) Beginning Without Sufficient Financial Reserves or Liquidity (cash)

Many families do not have as much savings as they would like. Or they are carrying too much debt. This is often a good reason to relocate, but it requires some thought and planning.

Four important questions people do not think about at the beginning include:

1. Do we have enough cash to explore other cities, shop for a new home, buy or rent, and then move?
2. Will there be a gap of employment that will affect qualifying for a home loan?
3. What about timing? Does our existing house have to sell to bankroll a move?
4. What if it takes longer to sell than we thought – what is our cash flow plan?

Fifty-seven percent of Americans have less than $10,000 in all savings accounts combined.

This chart shows total household debt in America, excluding mortgages.

Beginning the relocation process without knowing your available resources, and having a realistic plan, is a big mistake. It is like swimming across a lake, you do not want to get halfway across and discover you cannot make it. We always design a customized solution because no two families are alike.

6.) Not Having an Open Mind

If what you thought you knew turned out not to be true, how soon would you want to know? Relocating to another city, like traveling abroad, really opens our eyes. Speaking from experience, we were surprised at all that Austin offered that we thought we were giving up when we relocated.

The biggest mistakes we see with this one involves preconceived ideas. For example, someone may think they want an existing home, but they are not aware that new home builders are offering below market interest rates. This is a reason new home sales account for nearly one-third of all for-home sales according to Redfin.

Look at the difference between 2011, when new homes made up less than 6% of homes for sale, and now. And why not if you can get a below-market interest rate and a builder will cover closing costs. Different builders offer different incentives and they change all the time.

Because mortgage rates are higher than they have been in years, and it is much more difficult to qualify for a loan, having an open mind helps overcome this obstacle. "Should we sell our departure home or rent it out?" Or, "If we can afford to pay cash for a home in Austin, is that the right move?" These are just two examples of issues today’s homebuyer faces that were not a thing a few years ago.

7.) Insufficient Optimism

Relocating requires a considerable investment of time and energy - often on top of existing life commitments. Maintaining optimism and perseverance is key, even when faced with setbacks or unexpected challenges.

Sometimes we do not take an inventory of our lives or finances because we do not like what we think we will find. People who live in high-cost, high-tax, unsafe cities can get worn out by working hard but not feeling like they are getting ahead. No one can quite pinpoint when things changed, when they got hard, but it does tend to lead to a less optimistic outlook.

People forget what life was like when they had some margin in their life; when they had time to slow down and smell the roses. Relocation solved that for us.

8.) Not Allocating Sufficient Time & Energy

When it comes to relocating to another city, it is a tremendous amount of work. It can be positively life-changing in so many ways, but it takes a lot of time, energy, and some money.

The mistake we see is that people try take shortcuts with the process. They say, “I don't have time to complete a Life Inventory Questionnaire™ or a Financial Clarity Questionnaire™. I need to just get going.”

Have you heard these clichés:

• There’s never enough time to do it right, but there’s always enough time to do it over
• Measure twice, cut once

We made many mistakes when we relocated. Not because we did not follow the process, but because we did not have a process. That was the seed of Considering Austin - our desire to help others.

9.) Not Willing to Change Mind with New Information

Relocating often presents a paradox: it is best to follow a solid plan, but you must remain flexible. Great schedules fall apart. Houses that look good on the Internet do not look so good in person.

You may fall in love with a neighborhood only to learn that they are planning to open a sports park across the road or an apartment complex where you currently see greenspace.

If you want more examples, ask us. We will be happy to tell you some war stories, like the unscrupulous sales agent who ‘forgot’ to mention that the giant oak tree in the front yard was dead. Yes, there are bad actors in every city and it is important to know who they are and steer clear.

10.) Making Emotional Decisions That Are Not Rational

Humans make decisions based on emotions and then look for facts to validate their decisions. However, what ‘feels’ right to one person may ‘feel’ wrong to another.

A saying we coined when we were relocating – after much effort and frustration – was: we have to decide how to decide. That is easier said than done and solving that puzzle led to the unique process questionnaires in the first four steps of the Considering Austin process.

Here is an example of emotional vs. rational. Someone might say, “I don’t want to move away from my friends.” While saying this, they understand it is dangerous to be in debt and not have enough savings and that is a problem they cannot solve living in an expensive, high-tax city.

The mistake of making emotional decisions is often rooted in the delayed gratification paradox: play now, pay later, or vice versa. We all face these types of decisions every day. Successful people are better than average at resisting the temptation to procrastinate. Or, they get help to stay on track.

Cost of Making Mistakes

Flying a family of four to Austin for a 4-day weekend to check out the area and house shop can cost around $2,200 per person.

The relocation process, from the initial idea to a successful move, usually involves 4-5 trips:

1. Discovery
2. Purchase
3. Progress visit
4. Closing & inspections
5. Final move

But what if someone is operating without a plan or a guide and they can't find a house or they go into contract on a house and then change their mind? These kind of situations can easily require an extra trip, or two, or three to resolve.

Consider the following example of the cost of adding a couple more trips to the house shopping/buying process. What would a couple of extra trips cost? Below is an estimate of the costs for two extra trips - one for the whole family, and one without the kids:

• Extra trip - family of four: $8,874
• Extra trip - parents only: $3,327

These two extra trips, that total around $12,000 might have been avoided with a solid relocation plan and personal guidance. Where did that number come from?  Check out the two visiting Austin estimates below. The first one is a budget for the whole family; 4 days, Friday through Monday. The second estimate is a trip for just the parents; 3 days, leave Friday, return Sunday night.

Trip 1 - Whole Family

Trip 2 - Parents Only

0

Inflation over the last several years has really increased these costs. While this is a hypothetical California example, these numbers would probably be similar for a family exploring moving to Austin from Chicago or New York.

Please understand, I'm not judging people who need more trips to figure it all out, or those who make mistakes when house shopping long distance. It's hard. Sometime, I'll share our story. In retrospect, it's pretty humorous... almost embarrassing.

We learned the hard way because we had to figure it out as we went. There was no Considering Austin relocation service. And we had no one representing us as a buyer's agent or helping with Texas mortgage financing.

That is what Considering Austin is about; providing: 1) relocation consulting; 2) buyer's representation, when purchasing a house; and/or 3) mortgage lending. In terms of avoiding mistakes, the value of the first component - relocation consulting - easily exceeds $10,000.

And while it is difficult to estimate intangibles, minimizing drama and thriving sooner is priceless!

What Failing Looks Like

A failed relocation is when someone decides they have made a mistake, and they move back to where they came from within the first year or so:

• Sell Texas house, pay real estate commission
• Take loss
• Move back
• Rent
• Re-buy another house, usually not near the friends they left

The cost can be upwards of $50,000 or more. Not to mention all the negative emotions that surround that decision and all the work involved to backtrack.

A Case Study of Mistakes Made

Shortly after we relocated, a family friend moved to Austin too. This was before Considering Austin was created. Here are the highlights of their family's story and it is something we would like to help others avoid.

Their story:

• Sold home in CA to move to TX, the house they sold was recently remodeled ($100k)
• Moved to Austin
• After 6 months, decided to move back (major emotional drama)
• Waited until school year ended, then moved
• Had to rent TX house out to avoid loss
• Stress of being a long-distance landlord
• After one year, sold TX house
• Could not afford to re-buy in CA
• Four years later, still renters; missed all the 2021/22 real estate appreciation
• Looking to relocate out-of-state again, for the same economic/lifestyle reasons as before

It was sad to watch, and we miss them still. We all learn by making mistakes. Our journey was harder than it needed to be because we didn't know what we didn't know. We made a lot of mistakes. But now we know and it is very fulfilling helping others.

What Success Looks Like

Our favorite compliment is when clients say, “That went well, straightforward, no big surprises, no regrets. We are already settled in and loving it.”

If we work with a family, and they decide they do not want to relocate, or they do not want to relocate to Austin, that is okay.

Zig Ziglar famously said, “You can have everything in life you want if you will just help enough other people get what they want.”

We want people positioned to have a great rest of their life and to be on a sustainable financial path deep into retirement.

Avoiding the ten mistakes listed above goes a long way toward making the relocation process easy and efficient. That is our mission!

Resources:

• The Christian Science Monitor – Leaving California for Texas: https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2023/0824/Leaving-California-for-Texas-Mapping-where-Americans-move
• National Association of Realtors – Where People Moved in 2022: https://www.nar.realtor/blogs/economists-outlook/where-people-moved-in-2022
• U.S. Census Bureau – Demographics and Housing Characteristics: https://www.census.gov/data/tables/2023/dec/2020-census-dhc.html
• Architectural Digest, Americans Are Restless in 2024: https://www.architecturaldigest.com/reviews/moving/moving-trends-survey
• Redfin – New Construction Homes: https://www.redfin.com/news/new-construction-homes-one-third-of-inventory/
• U.S. Census Bureau – American Community Survey: https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/acs/data.html