Mindflow works from one place: Atlanta, Georgia. There is no Mindflow office in Austin and no address for us here, because none exists. This is a market we serve rather than a market we sit in, and saying so plainly is the point. Our one real location is here.
- The Austin metro median build year is 2002, nine years newer than Houston, DFW and San Antonio
- That gap is entirely suburban; the city of Austin reads 1994 and is 56.6% renter
- The ECAD ordinance puts a written HVAC age and condition grade on qualifying pre-sale homes
- A standard re-roof is usually permit-exempt; a fence over seven feet needs one
The newest housing stock in Texas, and it is all in the suburbs
On ACS 2020–2024 five-year estimates, the Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos metro has a median year of construction of 2002. Houston, Dallas-Fort Worth and San Antonio all read 1993 on the same table and vintage. Nine years newer than every peer is a real structural difference.
The whole of that difference lives outside the city. The city of Austin reads 1994, one year off the other metros. The city is also 56.6% renter and only 43.4% single-family detached, against 58.3% owner-occupancy and 59.0% detached across the metro.
For a home-service business the addressable market is overwhelmingly the suburban ring, and it is young. Newer stock shifts the work mix toward maintenance, efficiency and warranty-adjacent work rather than wholesale replacement, and it means the first big replacement wave for a 2002-median metro is arriving now.
Every qualifying home sale produces a written HVAC grade
Austin's Energy Conservation Audit and Disclosure ordinance, No. 20081106-047 of 6 November 2008 and amended by No. 20110421-002 of 21 April 2011, requires a professional energy audit before the sale of any home ten years or older served by Austin Energy inside the city limits.
The audit is performed by a certified RESNET rater or BPI building analyst, stays valid for ten years, must reach the buyer at least three days before the end of the option period, and covers HVAC system efficiency, age and condition, envelope and duct performance, and attic insulation.
Read that as a demand event rather than a regulation. Every qualifying sale generates a third-party document naming the condition of the HVAC system and the ducts, handed to a buyer who still has a repair-request mechanism and leverage. It is calendar-predictable, address-identifiable and bounded precisely by the Austin Energy service territory inside the city limits, which is the older half of the market rather than the newer suburban ring.
A re-roof usually needs no permit, and a fence over seven feet does
Austin's published list of work exempt from building permits includes asphalt shingles replacing existing asphalt shingles, and replacement of any roof covering that does not adversely affect the roof structure. Both exemptions fall away in the Wildland-Urban Interface area when 50% or more of the roofing is replaced.
Fences run the other way. Under City Code 25-2-899 and Ordinance No. 20230720-156, a permit is required if the fence sits in a floodplain, exceeds seven feet at any point, or exceeds six feet on residential property along a City right of way, the last also needing a Board of Adjustment variance.
One more thing worth knowing before quoting: from 10 July 2025 Austin runs the 2024 Uniform Mechanical and Plumbing Codes from IAPMO rather than the International codes most of Texas uses, alongside the 2024 IRC and the 2023 NEC. Contractors must also register with Building and Trade Contractor Services before any building or trade permit is issued.
Austin sits inside a wider state picture. Licensing, advertising-disclosure rules and market conditions apply across Texas. Read the Texas market notes.
Every figure on this page has a source and a date
Where we could not verify something to a primary source it is absent rather than estimated. That is why some of these market pages are shorter than others, and it is the same standard we apply to a client report.
You will notice what is missing: no cost per lead, no conversion rate, no local benchmark. Those figures move by market and by season, and any number published here would be wrong by the time you read it. Your own account holds the real one, and our calculators do the arithmetic once you have it.
Our documented results are in home services. We publish the complete measurement protocol before you pay anything: the six-layer audit, the sampling method, a real report with the numbers left in. No ranking guarantees.
Fair questions about working with us in Austin
What is ECAD and why does it matter to a contractor?
It is Austin's pre-sale energy audit ordinance. Homes ten years or older served by Austin Energy inside the city need an audit before sale, and the audit grades HVAC age and condition, ducts and attic insulation. It creates a predictable, document-backed demand moment during the option period.
Do I need a permit to replace a roof in Austin?
Usually not. The City lists like-for-like asphalt shingle replacement and non-structural roof covering replacement as exempt, unless the property is in the Wildland-Urban Interface area and half or more of the roofing is being replaced.
Is Austin housing newer than the rest of Texas?
At metro level yes, and by nine years on the same Census table. At city level no. The difference sits in the suburban ring.
Start with a measurement, not a pitch
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