Is San Antonio Overpopulated?

San Antonio is heavily populated, but it may be overpopulated and overcrowded. In this article we are going to dive into what areas are the most overcrowded, and this will help you assess if it is worth moving here. 

San Antonio has seen a huge population increase because of COVID-19. People were moving here prior but the catalyst for the fast influx of people was due to the pandemic. Before, San Antonio was a nice little secret where the city didn’t have a lot of developments and had a lot of militaries. 

People like to stay here because everything is a little bit cheaper, it’s affordable, and there’s a lot of places that are family oriented. This area is also a web-based design so you can get anywhere in the city within about 20 minutes. 

Harlan High School is a very popular school in San Antonio that got a lot of attention because of how overcrowded it seemed. Pictures of the crowded hallways were shared online, and a lot of parents expressed their concerns about their children’s safety and wellbeing. Unfortunately, NISD officials say that there’s little that can be done about the overcrowding concerns at Harlan HS.

 Just recently, there was a vote for Northside ISD to receive a $992 million bond to improve and expand schools in the district. That is good news, but the big spike in home sales will contribute to more parents needing to enroll their children in schools. 

The main highway from San Antonio to Austin, IH-35, is getting a road expansion that will cost billions of dollars. This expansion is really going to help alleviate some of the traffic, but by the time it’s completed who knows how many more developments there will be. Austin has seen a huge spike in house prices so families that were on the I-35 corridor (Buda, Kyle, Schertz, and New Braunfels) are now moving toward San Antonio because of its affordability.

 Let’s say a ranch owner sells its hundred acres to an investor for whatever amount of money. That developer is going to divide the land, with city approval, and build track homes, which is why these clustered communities are far away from the downtown San Antonio area. It’s not like it is in the east coast where the houses have been there for over a hundred of years and they’re mapped out prior to building. 

If you look at new construction homes on the northeast side, which is probably where a lot of the crowding is happening, there are not that many. On the other hand, the far west side has way more developments and the communities are very affordable. That is problematic because the infrastructure changes don't seem to be catching up with the developments that are happening. There are already established communities within the loop of 1604 and 410, and the people in those communities need resources, and there are only so many grocery stores. 

According to KSAT.com, the most crowded H-E-B is on I-35 in San Antonio. Thankfully, they are developing more amenities, grocery stores, and restaurants to accommodate for the influx of people moving to that area. When I show houses in that area it is very crowded and some of our clients will be deterred by the amount of traffic there is. 

Another article recently displayed how farmers and ranchers have been impacted by the new housing developments. The housing developments are affecting their ability to produce food for different distributors and make a living for themselves. 

There are more commercial improvements that are happening like multi-unit apartment complexes that are being built downtown, the east side, and the far west side. When there are a lot of multi-family developments it often time results in the development of more amenities. However, it does seem to drive the price of single-family homes higher because there’s more of an influx of people, jobs, schools. 

Another important thing to consider is that the Edwards Aquifer is low! The Edwards Aquifer supplies over 2 million people with drinking water in the San Antonio area. In this article, it states that the Aquifer is the lowest it has been in four years, which is really scary to think about. Hopefully, something is done because the population growth hasn’t shown any signs of slowing down.