Taylor, Texas

Samsung broke ground on its $17 billion-plus chip fab east of Taylor in 2022, and the site is staffing up for limited production by the end of 2026, with full-scale output following in 2028. Once fully running, Samsung expects the fab to support around 1,800 permanent jobs, on top of the thousands of construction jobs the build-out itself has already created. A second fab is planned to start construction in late 2026. Right now, in practical terms, that means more builders and more buyers competing for the same inventory and rising home values, but the bulk of the permanent hiring hasn't hit yet.

You're buying into a city still catching up to its own growth. Taylor's population has grown from about 16,000 in 2020 to nearly 18,000 today, and the city, the school district, and local retailers are all racing to keep pace rather than sitting ahead of it. Expect a downtown still filling in its storefronts, construction traffic near the fab site, and a district actively planning new campuses rather than one that already has the capacity built. The upside is price: you're getting in before all of that catches up, not after.

Taylor Independent School District, which currently runs about seven campuses covering elementary through Taylor High School. TISD's administration has said publicly it's planning for multiple enrollment growth scenarios tied to Samsung, including possible new campuses, so confirm which specific campus a home is zoned to rather than assuming district-wide capacity will hold. Boundaries can and likely will shift as the district grows.

It depends heavily on route. Taking SH 130 tollway, you can make it in around 30 minutes in light traffic; taking Highway 79 to I-35 to skip the toll, plan on 45 minutes to an hour, longer at peak commute times. Which route makes sense often comes down to which side of Taylor you're buying on, and we'll factor that into which community we show you if a daily Austin commute matters to your decision.

Yes, and it's one of the more affordable entry points into the eastern corridor right now. Resale runs from around $325,000 to $425,000 depending on the neighborhood, and new construction in communities like Spring Creek and Castlewood starts in the low $240,000s. That's meaningfully below Round Rock, Georgetown, or Pflugerville, and well below the $600,000 range you'd see in Leander or Liberty Hill. The gap exists because Taylor is still building out its amenities and retail, not because the homes are lower quality.

New construction is concentrated in a handful of communities: Spring Creek and Castlewood/Castlewood South on the new-build side, and The Ferguson downtown, an 82-unit condo project with units starting at $239,000, on the missing-middle side. Builders active include DRB Homes, Brightland Homes, Dream Finders Homes, Coventry Homes, and Starlight Homes. Inventory in some of these communities is moving fast enough that pricing and lot availability can shift within a few weeks, so we check current status before we send you anywhere.

No. Taylor works for plenty of buyers who have nothing to do with the fab: people who want acreage in Taylor Ranchettes or Southwood Hills Estates, buyers priced out of Round Rock and Georgetown, and people who just like small-town Texas with a walkable historic downtown. Samsung is the reason the market is moving the way it is, but it isn't the only reason to buy here. We'll help you figure out if it's the right fit either way.