Residents at Ventana Lakes, a master-planned community in northwest Katy developed by Arlington, Texas-based D.R. Horton (NYSE: DHI), could have a few hundred new neighbors.
A general plan for a new 460-acre community called Ventana Lakes East was submitted to the city of Houston planning commission Feb. 14. Requests for comment from D.R. Horton weren’t immediately returned.
The tract sits between Peek Road and the Grand Parkway, extending from Clay to Stockdick School Road. It would be east of Ventana Lakes and still within boundaries for Katy Independent School District schools, county appraisal records show. Those records also show the 460-acre tract valued at $11.07 million in 2018 belongs to an entity named HLB Harris Group. It bought the land in 1992.
In 2018, Ventana Lakes saw a 15 percent gain in annual starts compared to the year before, according to data from the housing research firm Metrostudy. It had 279 new home starts last year and currently counts 1,127 remaining units.
The west northwest market area, where Ventana Lakes falls, was the second-busiest region for new home construction last year. It counted 4,038 new home starts, almost a 5 percent jump from the year before.
And, D.R. Horton ranked first among homebuilders with 3,033 closings around Houston between Jan. 1-Dec. 31, 2018, Metrostudy data found. The builder accounts for 13.38 percent market share across the region. Homes in Ventana Lakes start at $215,990, according to the builder website.
Developers have several residential projects in the works for this area north of Interstate 10 and west of the Grand Parkway. In addition to Newland Communities’ 3,600-acre Elyson, Houston-based Trendmaker Homes recently announced a new community, Lakehouse, at the corner of Clay and Pitts Road. Pulte Homes and Lennar Corp.’s Katy Crossing isn’t too far away, either. However, developing in the Katy Prairie could require setting aside significant acreage for flood-control efforts.
-Fauzeya Rahman of the Houston Business Journal