Houston, famed for sprawl, bets on growing up

Developer Jacob Sudhoff remembers when Houston had a much different profile when the Texas metropolis was considered just a “cow and oil town” built around sprawl, suburbs, and anything-goes zoning.

But in the last few years, Houston has seen a boom in a high-rise, multifamily living that’s transforming neighborhoods around the famously decentralized city with numerous new 40-story towers taking root. Walkable neighborhoods and the condos and apartments drawing residents to these areas are revitalizing the Heights, Midtown, downtown, the Outer Loop, and the forthcoming McKenley Memorial City as well as the neighborhoods near the new Buffalo Bayou Park and the Allen Parkway.

Houston is projected to add roughly 16,000 units this year alone, according to a report from commercial real estate firm JLL, with another 23,000 in the pipeline. As prices have crept up to historic heights—$1,050 a month on average, making Houston one of the nation’s best rental bargains among big cities—occupancy remains at 90 percent, leading to strong rental demand and a positive outlook for the future. For the first time this year, according to the long-running Kinder Houston Area Survey administered by Rice University, a majority or near majority of local respondents wanted to live in denser, mixed-use neighborhoods.

“Houston now has an inward migration,” says Sudhoff. “A lot of people are moving to the urban core. We’ve never seen so many high-rises going up in the city, and every submarket has more going up.”

Vertical living taking root in Houston

While Houston isn’t changing overnight—the city’s expansive system of interstates and expanding rings of suburban development aren’t going anywhere, and more than 60 percent of the cities housing stock is single-family homes—there’s been a noteworthy shift toward apartments and condos, both as a lifestyle choice and an investment opportunity. In a metro were building out has been gospel—teachings challenged as the city’s highways become increasingly congested and Hurricane Harvey flooding brought issues with the city’s floodplain maps and development patterns to the fore—many Houstonians are looking for something different.

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