America’s fastest-growing city is getting some itty-bitty houses.
At less than 700 square feet, they are smaller than the average apartment in Dallas. The most affordable are under $160,000, and you might soon see more of them in North Texas.
Miami-based builder Lennar is bringing the first of this scaled-down home type to North Texas. The first will pop up in Princeton — the Collin County boomtown with the fastest growth rate in the nation for cities and towns home to more than 20,000 residents, according to the latest U.S. Census estimates.
That price range fits right into the affordability range for folks making $52,000 a year, which allows about 30% of a salary to be spent on housing, according to Zillow’s Affordability Calculator, which also factors in insurance and property taxes. That would include a $15,000 down payment.
D-FW Real Estate News
It’s called the Dream Collection. The two-story home is only 661 square feet. The first level includes an open floor plan shared between the kitchen and living room. You walk past the fridge and enter an owner’s suite that could function as a bedroom or office space.
Another lofted bedroom is located on the home’s top floor. And yes, this home has two bathrooms — but is tight on closet space.
There are only three of the smaller homes available for sale right now. The prices range from just over $157,000 to nearly $172,000. Prices were recently cut on two of the homes by more than $10,000.
By comparison, the median price of a home in Dallas-Fort Worth was $400,000 in July, according to data from the MetroTex Association of Realtors.
The houses are located within the Tillage Farms development, which includes a variety of home types. The most expensive home currently under construction is nearly $300,000. The master-planned community includes a swimming pool, community center, basketball courts and playground.
The smaller homes are geared towards first-time homebuyers as the region is experiencing a housing shortage. The estimated housing deficit in D-FW hit 49,204 in 2023 — that’s the number of families “doubling up” by living with non-relatives, minus the units available to buy or rent, according to the most recent data from Zillow.
It’s unclear if or how many more of these smaller homes Lennar plans to build in this community — or in D-FW at large.
Multiple attempts to contact the builder and Greg Mayberry, the firm’s Dallas-Fort Worth division president, were not returned before publication.
“With exceptionally affordable pricing, this new collection brings a unique opportunity in today’s market — especially for first-time homebuyers,” Mayberry said in a recent news release. “Tillage Farms delivers the thoughtful design, quality and value buyers expect from Lennar, located within an amenity-rich community in a highly sought-after Dallas suburb.”
Ted Wilson, the principal of Dallas-based market research firm Residential Strategies, said these properties are among the smallest newly constructed homes in Dallas-Fort Worth, excluding tiny homes.
A home like this could appeal to cost-conscious buyers looking to live in northern D-FW close to large employment centers, Wilson said.
“I think when you start looking at the mortgage payments on that stuff, it gets below rental rates,” he said. “You go out to Princeton, and you get this. It’s probably a nice little neighborhood. …The drive is pretty far, but there again, it appeals to certain types of people who have to drive.”
While the homes are new to D-FW, Lennar first tested the smaller homes in the San Antonio market. And they sold like hotcakes.
The builder announced plans for the homes in April 2023. The community, called Elm Trails, is on San Antonio’s East Side, near Converse. It featured 95 homes built on 20-foot lots.
By February 2024, 35 residents moved into their homes, and another 20 homes were under contract, according to reporting from the San Antonio Business Journal.
The smaller, sub-1,000 square-foot homes have expanded beyond the southern Texas market. Lennar announced in late August that it was bringing the Dream Collection to Anderson Farms, Ariz.
These homes, however, will be larger than the ones in North Texas. These homes offer four different floor plans ranging from 814 to 1,120 square feet, featuring two or three bedrooms and two bathrooms. The prices start in the mid $200,000s.
Wilson said Lennar operates in a price category all by itself, and the vast majority of builders in the D-FW market aren’t set up to build a property like this.
“It’s hitting a price point that nobody else is really touching,” he said of the planned small homes. “If affordability is an issue, and you want to have a detached house that you’re living in with a little yard, that’s one way to do it.”