Moving to Austin, TX: What New Residents Need to Know

Austin’s population reached 1,002,632 in the 2025 Census Bureau estimate, crossing the one-million mark for the first time. The city sits primarily within Travis County, with parts extending into Williamson and Hays counties — worth knowing since some local services and tax rates are set at the county level, not just the city level.

A new Texas resident must register their vehicle within 30 days of moving to the state, and update their driver’s license or ID within the same window — penalty fees apply once you miss it. See Reloca8’s DMV guide for the full process.

Austin Energy is a city-owned municipal utility, which places it outside the ERCOT-administered “Power to Choose” retail market that covers much of the rest of Texas. That’s a real difference from Dallas or Houston: Austin Energy customers can’t shop competing retail electric providers. New or transferred service (electric and water together, since Austin Water uses the same account system) is set up through coautilities.com, by phone, or in person. See Reloca8’s electricity & gas guide for the wider process.

Texas requires voter registration by a fixed deadline before each election, generally the 30th day before election day. If you move close to an election, that deadline can arrive faster than you expect — register through VoteTexas.gov as soon as you have a new address rather than waiting. Central Texas school districts, including Austin ISD, also use residential-address zoning for school assignment, so it’s worth checking your specific address against the district’s own attendance-zone locator before you sign a lease.

Texas has no state personal income tax, but relies heavily on property tax instead. Travis County’s adopted tax year 2025 rate is $0.375845 per $100 of property value — and that’s just the county-level line item; a typical Austin bill also layers on city, school district (like Austin ISD), and special-district rates on top of it, so the county rate alone understates your real total.

Austin’s median asking rent was $1,328 a month as of September 2026 (average one-bedroom $1,176, two-bedroom $1,432), per Apartment List’s rent report — and Austin has actually been one of the US metros where rents have fallen from their 2022–23 peak, worth knowing if you’re comparing against older figures you might have seen.