Collin's newcomers stretch dollars, legs

The Dallas Morning News - August 13, 2005

For many, a bigger home is better, and it's cheaper here than in many places

LOS GATOS, Calif. – Nestled on a wooded hillside in this tidy Silicon Valley community is a subdivision of newer tract homes with media rooms, breakfast nooks, granite countertops and other modern touches.

Like models on a Monopoly board, big new homes line the streets in the Twin Creeks subdivision in Allen. The homes are not unlike those you'd see in a similar high-income neighborhood in Allen, McKinney or Frisco – until you compare the price tags.

A $300,000 home in or near Collin County would cost about $1 million in Los Gatos.

When families move to North Texas from places like Silicon Valley, they are awestruck by the monster houses they can afford. They don't tend to hold back, said Jan Richey, a Realtor with Keller Williams in Frisco.

"Instead of buying the $300,000 house – which they should – they have so much more money from the equity in their previous house that they extend themselves as far as they can go," she said. "We have to protect them from themselves."


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