Quarterly Report · Published July 2026
State of Austin
luxury construction.
Every quarter we pull the City of Austin's permit data and read it the way a builder does. This is Q2 2026: what got permitted, where the estate work is concentrating, and what it means if you are planning a build.
594
New single-family permits issued in Austin in Q2 2026, up 61% from the winter trough
78746
Westlake leads every Austin zip in 5,000+ sq ft homes permitted over the past year
106
Homes of 5,000+ sq ft permitted in city limits in 12 months, flat while the overall market fell
87
Luxury-zip remodel permits in Q2, the strongest quarter of the past year
The Trend
New single-family permits, City of Austin.
Q2 2026 came in at 594 new single-family permits: up 13.8% on Q1 and 60.5% off the Q4 2025 trough, though still 7.3% below Q2 last year. Spring is when Austin files, and this spring showed real recovery without returning to the frenzy.
The Estate Segment
5,000+ sq ft homes: flat while everything else fell.
106 homes of 5,000 square feet or more were permitted inside city limits over the past 12 months, essentially unchanged from the year before, while overall permitting declined. The estate segment is outperforming the market.
The biggest Q2 filings: a 15,081 sq ft home with basement on Craggy Point, a three-story 10,951 sq ft build on Scenic Drive, and a string of 8,000+ sq ft projects in Tarrytown and Northwest Hills. Basements, long rare in Austin, keep showing up in the largest builds.
5,000+ sq ft homes permitted, trailing 12 months
The Remodel Wave
West Austin is rebuilding what it already owns.
The seven wealthiest west-Austin zips logged 87 remodel and addition permits in Q2, the strongest quarter of the past year and roughly a quarter of all remodel activity in the city. April alone hit 36. With estate lots scarce, the money is going into transforming the houses already sitting on them. That matches exactly what we see in Westlake, Lost Creek, and Rob Roy every week.
The Big One
A billion dollars on Lake Austin, permitted in a day.
On June 8, the Four Seasons Private Residences Lake Austin pulled 77 building permits in a single day for its 210-acre project on Bridge Point Parkway, weeks after closing a construction loan reported near $870M. It is the largest luxury residential bet in Austin history, and it plants the market's flag firmly on the lake.
Methodology
How we read the data.
Source: City of Austin Issued Construction Permits open dataset, pulled July 6, 2026. Counts cover building permits in Austin's permitting jurisdiction only. Westlake Hills, Rollingwood, Dripping Springs, Spicewood, and most of the 78733 corridor permit separately, so true metro luxury volume runs higher than these figures.
Declared permit valuations in Austin are nominal and unreliable for residential work, so we use square footage as the luxury proxy: homes of 5,000+ square feet. Permits lag construction starts by weeks to months. A March filing spike suggests some projects rushed to file ahead of process changes; we note it rather than adjust for it.
Questions about the data, or want the next report in your inbox? Call (512) 590-2181 or ask Beckett.
Planning a build in this market?
We publish our cost ranges too. Start with the numbers, then walk the land with us.