Ottawa vs Austin: which should you move to?
Ottawa or Austin? Housing, rent, crime, climate, income, taxes and transit, side by side, from each city's own published figures. Written for someone deciding where to live, not for a ranking.
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The two housing bills are in different currencies, and held against local pay they are far apart even though the homes are not. Ottawa's composite benchmark and Austin's median sale price are each about 6.2 times local median household income, but mortgage, property tax and insurance come to about $3,350 CAD a month in Ottawa, roughly 39% of the city's 2020 median, and about $4,041 USD in Austin, roughly 54% of its 2024 median. The gap is a 7.03% mortgage rate against 4.34% and a property tax of $9,019 a year on Austin's median house against $5,262 CAD, which is how Texas collects what it does not take in income tax. The labor market is Austin's, with metro unemployment at 3.7% in July 2026 against 6.8% in Ottawa-Gatineau. Homicide favors Ottawa, 21 in 2025 at 1.59 per 100,000 against 51 at about 5.1. Choose Ottawa for coverage that comes with residency, transit and French schooling. Choose Austin for the job market, no state income tax and an 11.2 C January instead of -10.0 C.
Ottawa prices are in CAD and Austin prices are in USD. The tables leave them in their own currency and compare ratios and rates instead; a conversion would be stale by the time you read it.
| Measure | Ottawa | Austin | Advantage |
|---|---|---|---|
| City population | 1,188,114 (2025) | 1,002,632 (2025) | Not directly comparable |
| Metro population | 1,700,014 (2025) | 2,620,945 (2025) | Not directly comparable |
| Five-year growth Growth is pressure on rents and roads as much as it is opportunity, so it is reported without a winner. | 8.9% (2016-2021) | 4.6% (2020-2025) | Not directly comparable |
What a home costs in each
The figures the two cities' rent-versus-buy and mortgage calculators run on, read from the same tables.
| Measure | Ottawa | Austin | Advantage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Benchmark home price MLS® HPI or equivalent benchmark. Lower is treated as the advantage, which is the buyer's view rather than the owner's. | $634,000 (July 2026) | $560,000 (August 2026) | Not directly comparable |
| Detached house benchmark | $725,000 | $527,943 | Not directly comparable |
| Apartment or condominium benchmark | $385,500 | $355,596 | Not directly comparable |
| Two-bedroom rent | $1,916/mo (average, October 2025) | $1,812/mo (average, August 2026) | Not directly comparable |
| One-bedroom rent | $1,593/mo | $1,421/mo | Not directly comparable |
| Two-bedroom rent against median income A year of two-bedroom rent as a share of the median household income below. A household paying the median rent out of the median income is a fiction, but it is the same fiction in both columns and it crosses currencies. | 22.5% of a year's income | 24.0% of a year's income | Ottawa |
| Mortgage payment on the benchmark, 20% down 25 years in Ottawa against 30 in Austin, each compounding the way its own country's lenders do. The rates are not a spread you can shop: they are what each market charges. | $2,762/mo at 4.34% | $2,990/mo at 7.03% | Not directly comparable |
| Price to household income Benchmark price divided by the median household income below. A ratio is comparable across currencies; the dollars are not. | 6.2× | 6.2× | Even |
| Property tax on the benchmark home The effective rate on market value, which is what the two rates have in common and what the Advantage column is decided on; the bills are in each city's own dollars. | $5,262/yr (0.83%, 2026) | $9,022/yr (1.611%, 2025) | Ottawa |
| Transfer tax on the benchmark home Compared as a share of the price. Where the seller pays it, it is a cost of leaving rather than arriving. | $9,155 (buyer pays) | None | Austin |
| Rent control A cap protects a sitting tenant and does nothing for the next lease, so neither column is simply better. | 2.1% guideline (2026) | Forbidden by state law | Not directly comparable |
Ottawa: About 0.83% of market value. Ottawa levies roughly 1.26%, but against a Current Value Assessment frozen at 1 January 2016 values, because Ontario has deferred every reassessment since. The average urban home is assessed at $415,000 and pays about $5,246 in 2026, which on the $634,000 composite benchmark is 0.83%. Ottawa's municipal taxes on a representative detached house were the lowest of Ontario's ten largest cities in 2025. Austin: About 1.61% of value for a homesteaded owner, worked out on the $560,000 median sale price. A house in the City of Austin and Austin ISD is taxed by five units for 2025, which add to 2.046485 per $100 before any exemption. Each takes its own homestead exemption off the appraised value first: Austin ISD the state's $140,000, the City, Travis County and Central Health 20%, and Austin Community College 1% with a $5,000 floor. So Travis County levies 0.375845 per $100 on $448,000 after a $112,000 exemption, $1,684; City of Austin levies 0.524017 per $100 on $448,000 after a $112,000 exemption, $2,348; Austin ISD levies 0.9252 per $100 on $420,000 after a $140,000 exemption, $3,886; Austin Community College levies 0.1034 per $100 on $554,400 after a $5,600 exemption, $573; Central Health levies 0.118023 per $100 on $448,000 after a $112,000 exemption, $529. The five come to $9,019 a year, 1.61% of the price. Without a homestead, as a landlord or a buyer who never files, the same house owes $11,460. These are the 2025 rates, the bills mailed in October 2025. For 2026 the City has adopted 0.579948, the county 0.38621, Central Health 0.132863 and ACC 0.103643, and Austin ISD has proposed 0.9184; on the same house those would come to about 1.67%.
How safe each city is, by the numbers it publishes
Police-reported figures for the most recent year each force or statistics agency has released. Rates describe a whole city or metro area, and the spread between neighbourhoods inside one city is usually wider than the gap between the two cities.
| Measure | Ottawa | Austin | Advantage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Crime Severity Index Statistics Canada's weighted index for the metropolitan area, where 100 is Canada in 2006. American cities have no equivalent series. | 50.6 (2025) | Not published | Not directly comparable |
| Violent crime per 100,000 Canada counts every violent Criminal Code incident; the FBI counts four offences. The Canadian figure is always the larger one for that reason alone. | 814 (2025) | 421 (2025) | Not directly comparable |
| Property crime per 100,000 | 2,835 (2025) | 3,093 (2025) | Not directly comparable |
| Homicides Counts, not rates, and a single year in a small city moves a long way on chance alone. What each figure covers is under the table. | 21 (2025) | 51 (2025) | Not directly comparable |
The Ontario-part CSI rose from 46.85 in 2021 to 54.20 in 2023, held at 54.12 in 2024 and fell 6% to 50.61 in 2025 (table 35-10-0026-01). The violent crime rate has kept climbing, from 744 per 100k in 2021 to 814 in 2025, while property crime peaked in 2024 at 2,957 per 100k and eased to 2,835 in 2025.
What the rates cover: Total violent Criminal Code violations, rate per 100,000, Ottawa-Gatineau CMA Ontario part, table 35-10-0177-01 (10,745 incidents).
Homicides: Ottawa-Gatineau CMA Ontario part, table 35-10-0177-01; rate 1.59 per 100,000. 2024 was 27 (2.10 per 100k), the highest of the last five years.
On the FBI's definitions, violent offenses in Austin went from 5,335 in 2022 to 5,046 in 2023, 4,692 in 2024 and 4,221 in 2025, a 10% drop in the last year and 21% in three, and property offenses from 35,035 to 32,900, 32,407 and then 31,011. APD's own NIBRS records for 2025 show aggravated assaults down 13% (3,038 to 2,652), robberies down 5% (835 to 790) and motor vehicle thefts down 26% (5,908 to 4,345), while rapes rose from 501 to 541 and drug offenses, which rise and fall with enforcement, went from 4,097 to 5,256. The 2025 CDE counts were read on 27 September 2026 from a feed last refreshed on 15 September and can still be revised, and APD notes that its open data may differ from its official figures.
What the rates cover: Computed: 4,221 violent offenses (murder, rape, robbery and aggravated assault) in the FBI Crime Data Explorer's summarized data for the Austin Police Department (ORI TX2270100) in calendar 2025, divided by the 1,002,632 Vintage 2025 city population. On the CDE's own agency population of 1,000,639 the rate is 422. APD does not publish a total on this definition: its open NIBRS data sort offenses into crimes against persons (19,469 in 2025, of which 9,464 simple assaults and 5,918 intimidation) and crimes against property (44,250, with robbery, fraud and vandalism inside it), so neither of its totals is the FBI's violent or property count. Summing APD's own 2025 records on the FBI's definition gives 4,219, within two of the CDE.
Homicides: 51 murders and nonnegligent manslaughters in 2025 in both the FBI CDE and APD's open NIBRS data, against 66 in 2024, about 5.1 per 100,000 on the city population. APD's assistant chief put the year's homicides at 55 in January 2026 (KUT), and APD's dataset separately lists 14 negligent manslaughters and 7 justifiable homicides, which the FBI does not count as murder. The high point in the CDE series since 2021 is 81, in 2021.
Winters, summers and what the weather can do to a house
| Measure | Ottawa | Austin | Advantage |
|---|---|---|---|
| January mean | -10.0 °C | 11.2 °C | Not directly comparable |
| July mean | 21.2 °C | 29.9 °C | Not directly comparable |
| Precipitation a year | 930 mm | 921 mm | Not directly comparable |
| Snowfall a year | 232 cm | 1 cm | Not directly comparable |
| Sunshine a year | 2,084 hours | 2,644 hours | Austin |
Environment and Climate Change Canada 1991-2020 normals at Ottawa Macdonald-Cartier Int'l A (climate ID 6106000). Annual mean 6.5 C, rainfall 757.2 mm. Sunshine hours are from the 1981-2010 normals at Ottawa CDA (climate ID 6105976) because the 1991-2020 airport table does not publish sunshine totals.
Hazards: Cold winters with regular snowstorms and freezing rain, spring flooding along the Ottawa River (2017 and 2019), summer heat and humidity, occasional severe thunderstorms and tornadoes (September 2018, the May 2022 derecho), and wildfire smoke episodes such as June 2023.
NOAA NCEI 1991-2020 normals for Austin Camp Mabry (station USW00013958), the official Austin climate station: January mean 52.2F, July mean 85.8F, annual mean 70.0F, 36.25 in of precipitation, 0.2 in of snow. August is the warmest month at 86.5F, with a mean high of 97.8F; July's mean high is 96.6F and January's mean low is 41.8F. May (5.04 in) and October (3.91 in) are the wettest months, and February (1.89 in) and July (1.96 in) the driest. The normals count 122.8 days a year at 90F or above, 28.7 at 100F or above and 11.9 nights at or below freezing. Austin-Bergstrom International Airport (USW00013904), southeast of downtown, averages 50.1F in January and 84.5F in July with 35.57 in of rain, and its nights run colder, with 33.0 at or below freezing a year. Converted here to 11.2 C, 29.9 C, 921 mm and 0.5 cm. Sunshine hours are the older 1961-1990 NCDC means (2,644 hours, 60% of possible), since the 1991-2020 normals do not include sunshine.
Hazards: Flash flooding on the creeks that cross the city is the recurring danger. The Memorial Day flood of 1981 sent Shoal Creek through central Austin and killed 13 people. On 30 to 31 October 2013 a band of 12 to 14 in (305 to 356 mm) of rain between Wimberley and Driftwood, with 6 to 10 in (152 to 254 mm) over central Travis County, sent Onion Creek through southeast Austin, damaging more than 500 homes and killing five people; in 2014 the city authorized $60 million to buy out homes in the Onion Creek floodplain. Over Memorial Day weekend 2015 the Blanco River at Wimberley, upstream in Hays County, rose from about 5 ft to 41 ft (1.5 m to 12.5 m) in four hours overnight and destroyed 350 to 400 homes in the town, and on the holiday itself Camp Mabry recorded 5.20 in (132 mm) and Shoal Creek flooded again. On 4 to 5 July 2025, 15 to 20 in (381 to 508 mm) fell on the headwaters of Cow Creek and Big Sandy Creek northwest of the city; the Central Texas floods of that week killed 139 people, 18 of them in Travis, Williamson and Burnet counties. Heat is the season to plan around: the normals give Camp Mabry 28.7 days a year at or above 100F (37.8 C), and 2023 had 80, including 45 in a row from 8 July to 21 August that broke the 27-day run of 2011, which still holds the record for a year with 90. The station's highest reading is 112F (44.4 C), in September 2000 and again in August 2011. Cold is rare and badly handled when it comes. Winter Storm Uri left 6.4 in (16.3 cm) of snow at Camp Mabry on 14 to 15 February 2021 and a low of 7F (-13.9 C) on the 16th, the coldest there since December 1989 (the airport reached 6F, or -14.4 C), with 164 hours of freezing temperatures. ERCOT cut power across the state grid from 15 to 18 February, about 4.5 million customers lost it at the worst, more than 40% of Austin Energy's customers were without power and the city was under a boil-water notice for seven days. Texas counted 246 deaths from the storm, 28 of them in Travis County. Drought is the slow hazard. Austin's water depends on Lakes Buchanan and Travis, the Highland Lakes reservoirs LCRA manages; their combined storage fell to 42% in March 2024, when most of LCRA's downstream farm customers went without lake water, and the July 2025 rains took it from 51% to more than 95%. It stood at about 92% on 1 July 2026.
What people earn and what the government takes
| Measure | Ottawa | Austin | Advantage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Median household income | $102,000 CAD (2020) | $90,430 USD (2024) | Not directly comparable |
| Unemployment rate Statistics Canada and the Bureau of Labor Statistics define unemployment slightly differently; the Canadian measure runs about a point higher on the same labour market. | 6.8% (July 2026) | 3.7% (July 2026) | Not directly comparable |
| Sales tax | 13% | 8.25% | Austin |
| Top marginal income tax Federal plus provincial or state. The American figure leaves out payroll taxes and the cost of health insurance, both of which a Canadian household covers through the tax it pays here. | 53.53% | 37% | Austin |
| Income tax on $100,000, single filer Computed from each jurisdiction's brackets at a single filer's $100,000 and rounded to the dollar, so a gap of a dollar is rounding rather than tax. Two cities in one province or state are shown as Even, because there the two cells describe the same tax and whatever separates them is method. | $21,930 CAD | $13,449 USD | Not directly comparable |
The federal government is the anchor employer: 130,628 of 279,707 federal public servants were based in the National Capital Region at March 31, 2025, and Budget 2025 announced about 28,000 more public service job cuts by 2029. Regional unemployment ran from 6.4% in mid 2025 to 7.3% in late 2025 before easing to 6.8% in July 2026.
Main sectors: Federal public administration, Technology (Kanata North, Shopify, telecom and defence), Health care and hospitals, Post-secondary education, Tourism and national institutions.
Property tax is set by the City of Ottawa; not verified here.
BLS counted 1,421,700 nonfarm jobs in the Austin MSA in July 2026 (not seasonally adjusted), up 23,800 or 1.7% on the year. Mining, logging and construction grew fastest (+5.5%), then professional and business services (+3.2%), the largest sector at 294,600 jobs, and other services (+2.7%), while information shrank 4.9% and government, at 201,000 jobs with the state capital and the University of Texas inside it, was flat. The seasonally adjusted series (FRED AUST448NA) was 1,424,000 in August 2026, 1.2% above August 2025. Average weekly wages across the metro were $1,957 in the first quarter of 2026 against $1,654 nationally. Opportunity Austin, the chamber's economic development program, lists Dell Technologies, Apple, Samsung Austin Semiconductor, Tesla, H-E-B, Amazon's fulfillment centers, the State of Texas, the University of Texas, Ascension Seton, St. David's HealthCare and Baylor Scott & White among the employers with 6,000 or more local jobs. bls.gov answered 403 to curl and FRED refused it, so both were read through the web fetcher.
Main sectors: Professional and business services, the metro's largest sector, Technology and advanced manufacturing (Dell Technologies, Apple, Tesla, Samsung Austin Semiconductor, AMD, Applied Materials), Government and education (the state capital, the University of Texas at Austin, the City of Austin), Trade, transportation and utilities (H-E-B, Amazon fulfillment centers), Health care (Ascension Seton, St. David's HealthCare, Baylor Scott & White).
Property tax is the local levy that matters. Tax Foundation puts Texas's effective property tax rate on owner-occupied homes at 1.40%, and school districts must exempt $140,000 of a homestead's value from their tax, plus another $60,000 for owners 65 or older or disabled, after voters raised the general exemption from $100,000 in November 2025. Part of the City of Austin's own rate, 8.75 cents per $100 of taxable value approved with Project Connect in November 2020, pays for the transit program. In November 2025 Austin voters rejected Proposition Q, a city tax rate increase that would have raised nearly $110 million, by 63% to 37%. The county, school district and other levies on the same bill belong to the housing layer.
Whether you need a car
| Measure | Ottawa | Austin | Advantage |
|---|---|---|---|
| System | OC Transpo (buses, O-Train Lines 1, 2 and 4, Para Transpo); STO serves Gatineau | CapMetro buses, including four CapMetro Rapid (formerly MetroRapid) lines, and the Red Line, a 32-mile, 10-station commuter rail line from Leander to downtown (CapMetro Rail, long branded MetroRail); no light rail yet, with Project Connect's first 9.8-mile phase due in 2033 | Not directly comparable |
| Commute by public transit | 11.2% (2021) | 3.0% (2024) | Ottawa |
| Walk or cycle to work | 8.5% (2021) | 4.1% (2024) | Ottawa |
| Airport | Ottawa Macdonald-Cartier International Airport, YOW, 4.9 million passengers in 2025, up 6% on 2024 (Ottawa International Airport Authority, 2025 results) | Austin-Bergstrom International Airport (AUS), 21,666,852 passengers in 2025, 0.4% fewer than 2024's 21,762,904 and below the 2023 record of 22.1 million, per the airport's calendar-year activity report; 1.06 million of them were international. It sits about 5 miles southeast of downtown on the former Bergstrom Air Force Base and replaced Robert Mueller Municipal Airport in 1999. | Not directly comparable |
70.6 million O-Train and bus trips in 2025, up 3.9% on 2024 (OC Transpo report to Transit Committee, February 12, 2026). Ridership fell in early 2026: 11.5 million trips in January-February versus 12.4 million a year earlier.
CapMetro carried 26,283,400 unlinked trips in 2025, 24,067,200 of them by bus and 620,600 on the Red Line, and about 77,400 a weekday in the second quarter of 2026, 1,900 of them by train (APTA ridership reports, as cited by Wikipedia; APTA's PDFs refused the fetcher). Two new CapMetro Rapid lines, 800 and 837, opened in February 2025 and reached 10-minute service in June 2026, and the Red Line gained McKalla Station in 2024, with North Burnet/Uptown Station due in 2027; the Green Line commuter rail project has no funding, environmental review or timeline. Light rail is the unfinished promise. Voters approved Project Connect in November 2020 with a city property tax increase of 8.75 cents per $100 of value, for about 20 miles of light rail reaching the airport at $7.1 billion (Texas Tribune). Its first phase is now 9.8 miles and 15 stations in three directions from downtown, no longer reaching the airport, at an estimated $8.2 billion or more; construction is set to start in 2027 and trains to run in 2033. The FTA gave it environmental clearance in January 2026, but the plan counts on about $4.1 billion in federal money that has not been awarded, and a lawsuit over the scaled-back project is still open.
Health care, schools and what each city is like
Health care
Care is publicly funded through OHIP after a residency waiting period for newcomers, with prescription drugs, dental and vision outside the public plan for most working-age adults. The main hospitals are The Ottawa Hospital (Civic and General campuses), CHEO for children, the Queensway Carleton and Montfort; a replacement Civic campus was promised for 2028 but construction on the hospital itself had not begun as of 2026, and finding a family doctor is the hardest part of access, with the Ontario College of Family Physicians projecting 4.4 million Ontarians without one by 2026.
Education
The University of Ottawa (bilingual) and Carleton University are the large universities, with Algonquin College and La Cite for applied programs. Publicly funded schools run through four boards: the Ottawa-Carleton District School Board, the Ottawa Catholic School Board, and French-language public and Catholic boards, so French immersion and full French schooling are both widely available.
Living there
Ottawa is a government town that behaves like a mid-sized city: quiet downtown evenings, a large share of households with two stable incomes, and a weekend life built around the Rideau Canal, the Gatineau Park hills across the river and the river pathways. Winters are long and cold, with roughly 232 cm of snow in a normal year, and summers are warm and humid. The O-Train light rail has had reliability problems since it opened in 2019, and the bus network has been cut back, so most households still drive.
Health care
Care is paid for through employer or marketplace insurance, Medicare and Medicaid, and Texas is one of the ten states that have not expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act (KFF, August 2026). It had the highest uninsured rate of any state in 2024: 16.7%, or 5,152,427 of 30,799,312 people, against 8.2% nationally and 12.0% in Georgia, the next highest, on the ACS 2024 1-year estimates. The City of Austin's rate was 13.0% and Travis County's 12.6%. Ascension Seton runs Dell Seton Medical Center at The University of Texas, the teaching hospital of UT's Dell Medical School, in partnership with Central Health; it is the region's only adult Level I trauma center and serves 11 Central Texas counties. St. David's HealthCare, a partnership between HCA Healthcare and two local nonprofits, has more than 160 sites and calls itself the Austin area's fourth-largest private employer, and Baylor Scott & White joins both systems on the chamber's list of employers with 6,000 or more local jobs. UT and the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation are building the UT Dell Medical Center, with a new UT MD Anderson Cancer Center, beside Dell Seton on the former Frank Erwin Center site, to open in 2030; the UT System put the plan at $2.5 billion when it was announced in August 2023. This file did not verify a wait time figure for primary or specialist care.
Education
Austin ISD, which covers 230 square miles in the middle of the metro, counted 65,951 students in fall 2026, down 3,765 from 69,716 in 2025-26 and from 72,702 in 2024-25. More than 6,400 students enrolled at the end of last year did not return, and the district fell more than 2,000 short of its own projection (Austin Current, 24 September 2026); district officials told KUT that more than half of the 2025-26 loss could be attributed to families' fear of immigration enforcement, with housing costs and falling birth rates also named. In November 2025 the board approved closing and consolidating 10 schools from the 2026-27 school year, affecting 3,796 students and removing 6,319 seats, together with 24 turnaround plans the Texas Education Agency requires for campuses with repeated unacceptable ratings, adopted to head off state-ordered closures or a takeover. The University of Texas at Austin enrolled a record 55,000 students in fall 2025, 44,314 of them undergraduates, the largest total in its history.
Living there
Austin is the Texas state capital and a university town that has become a technology metro, and its growth has outrun what the city has built for it. The metro passed 2.6 million in 2025 after adding 337,554 people since April 2020, but the city grew by less than 5%, and in 2024-25 Travis County lost 6,590 more people to the rest of the country than it gained, so domestic movers now settle in Williamson and Hays counties instead. Inside the city a quarter of workers work from home, 57.5% drive alone and 3.0% take transit, and the one rail line carries about 1,900 riders a weekday. Summer sets the terms of daily life, with a July mean of 85.8F at Camp Mabry and about 29 days at 100F or more in a normal year, and the creeks that cross the city flood fast. Texas takes no income tax and has the highest uninsured rate of any state. The open question is whether Austin can build the transit and keep the schools its growth calls for: voters approved light rail in 2020, and six years later the first 9.8 miles are not due until 2033 and have no federal money, while Austin ISD, down more than 14,000 students in a decade, closed ten schools in 2026.
Where each city wins, and where it loses
Ottawa's figures are in Canadian dollars and Austin's in US dollars, so each is read against local pay, and on that reading the two homes cost the same. Ottawa's composite benchmark was $634,000 CAD in July 2026, down 0.5%; Austin's median sale price was $560,000 USD in August 2026 on Unlock MLS, down 4.3%. Each is about 6.2 times local median household income, $102,000 CAD in Ottawa in 2020 and $90,430 USD in Austin in 2024. At 20% down, Ottawa's mortgage at 4.34% is $2,762 CAD a month over 25 years, and Austin's $448,000 loan at Freddie Mac's 7.03% of 24 September 2026 about $2,990 USD over 30. Property tax is 0.83% of market value in Ottawa, $5,262 CAD a year, against $9,019 USD from Austin's five taxing units, an effective 1.61% with a homestead and $11,460 without. With insurance at $145 CAD and $300 USD a month, the owners carry about $3,350 CAD and $4,041 USD, roughly 39% and 54% of local median income. A two-bedroom averaged $1,916 CAD in October 2025 and $1,812 USD in August 2026. Ontario caps increases at 2.1% for 2026, but only in units first occupied before 15 November 2018; Texas forbids rent control by statute.
Homicide is the one count that crosses the border intact, and it favors Ottawa, though Ottawa's covers the Ontario part of its metro and Austin's covers the city. The Ontario part of Ottawa-Gatineau recorded 21 homicides in 2025, 1.59 per 100,000, down from 27 in 2024; Austin recorded 51, about 5.1 per 100,000, after 66 in 2024 and 81 in 2021, though APD's assistant chief put 2025 at 55 and nothing published explains the difference. The other rates are different instruments. Statistics Canada put the Crime Severity Index for the Ontario part at 50.61 in 2025, down 6% and below the national 75.0; American cities have no equivalent. Ottawa's violent rate of 813.79 per 100,000 counts every violent Criminal Code violation, common assault and uttering threats included; Austin's 421 is 4,221 FBI-definition offenses of murder, rape, robbery and aggravated assault, divided by the Census estimate. Property crime, 2,834.59 per 100,000 against 3,093, is defined differently too. The directions differ: Ottawa's violent rate has risen every year since 2021, from 744 per 100,000, while Austin's violent offenses fell 10% in 2025 and 21% in three years. The Austin counts were read on 27 September 2026 and can still be revised.
The pair comes close to holding both ends of this site's range. Ottawa's January mean of -10.0 C at the airport is the coldest of the fourteen cities compared, and Austin's July mean of 29.9 C at Camp Mabry the second-warmest, behind Dallas. The other halves are 11.2 C for Austin's January and 21.2 C for Ottawa's July. Precipitation is nearly level, 929.8 mm against 921 mm, but Ottawa takes 231.9 cm of it as snow and Austin 0.5 cm. Sunshine is on different series, 2,083.7 hours for Ottawa on the 1981-2010 normals and 2,644 for Austin on 1961-1990. Ottawa's hazards are inland and recurring: freezing rain on the power lines, spring flooding along the Ottawa River in 2017 and 2019, the September 2018 tornadoes, the May 2022 derecho and wildfire smoke such as June 2023's. Austin's are heat, 28.7 days a year at or above 100F (37.8 C) in the normals and 80 in 2023; flash floods, as in July 2025, when the Central Texas floods killed 139 people; and the rare hard freeze, when Winter Storm Uri left 6.4 in (16.3 cm) of snow, ERCOT cut power across the state grid and more than 40% of Austin Energy's customers lost it.
Both are capitals with government as a large employer, and the labor markets are in different condition. The Austin metro's unemployment rate was 3.7% in July 2026, seasonally adjusted, on 1,421,700 nonfarm jobs, and government, with the state capital and the University of Texas inside it, was flat at 201,000. Ottawa-Gatineau's rate was 6.8% the same month, above Canada's 6.4%. Its anchor is the federal public service, with 130,628 of 279,707 federal public servants based in the National Capital Region at 31 March 2025, and Budget 2025 announced about 28,000 more positions to go by 2029. Median household income was $102,000 CAD in Ottawa in 2020 and $90,430 USD in Austin in 2024. The tax systems collect in opposite places. Ontario levies a provincial income tax on top of the federal one, so $100,000 pays about $21,930 CAD before CPP and EI, with a top combined rate of 53.53% and 13% HST. Texas levies none, so the same salary pays $13,449 USD in federal tax for 2025, before 7.65% payroll tax; the top rate is the federal 37% and sales tax is 8.25%. The property tax carries the load instead, an effective 1.61% on Austin's median house against 0.83% in Ottawa.
Ottawa's transit is troubled and still well ahead of Austin's. In the 2021 census 11.2% of Ottawa commuters took transit and 8.5% walked or cycled, counted in May 2021 with remote work at its height, so the share now is unknown rather than low. In Austin in 2024, 3.0% took transit, 4.1% walked or cycled, 57.5% drove alone and 24.8% worked from home. OC Transpo carried 70.6 million trips in 2025 on buses and O-Train Lines 1, 2 and 4, up 3.9%, though the O-Train has had reliability problems since it opened in 2019 and January and February 2026 slipped to 11.5 million trips from 12.4 million a year earlier. CapMetro carried 26,283,400 trips in 2025, 620,600 of them on the Red Line, a 32-mile commuter rail line from Leander to downtown. Austin voters approved light rail in November 2020; its first phase, now 9.8 miles and 15 stations at an estimated $8.2 billion or more, is due to carry passengers in 2033 and counts on about $4.1 billion in federal money that has not been awarded. Flying favors Austin: Austin-Bergstrom handled 21,666,852 passengers in 2025 against 4.9 million at Ottawa, where many trips connect through Toronto or Montreal.
Health care is where the border shows most. In Ottawa, OHIP pays for physician and hospital care with nothing due at the point of use after a residency wait for newcomers, though prescriptions, dental and vision mostly fall outside it. The bottleneck is a family doctor: the Ontario College of Family Physicians projected 4.4 million Ontarians without one by 2026, and the replacement Civic campus, promised for 2028, had not begun construction. In Austin care is bought through an employer or marketplace plan, Medicare or Medicaid, and Texas is one of the ten states that have not expanded Medicaid. It had the highest uninsured rate of the fifty states in 2024, 16.7%, and the City of Austin's was 13.0%. Dell Seton Medical Center is the region's only adult Level I trauma center. This site verified no wait time figure for either city. Ottawa has four publicly funded school boards, so French immersion and full French schooling are ordinary choices. Austin ISD counted 65,951 students in fall 2026, down 3,765 in a year, and its board approved closing and consolidating 10 schools. The University of Ottawa and Carleton are Ottawa's universities; the University of Texas enrolled a record 55,000 students in fall 2025.
What people underestimate is that a home at the same 6.2 times local pay costs 39% of income to hold in Ottawa and 54% in Austin, and that both causes of the gap carry a date. The rate is one. Ottawa's 4.34% is fixed for a five-year term and then renews at whatever the rate is then, while Austin's 7.03% holds for thirty years and can be refinanced down; at the 6.67% most of this site's American cities were written at in August, Austin's carry would be about $3,934. The tax is the other. Ottawa levies about 1.26% against assessments frozen at 1 January 2016, because Ontario has deferred every reassessment since, which is why the bill works out to 0.83% of what a buyer pays today, and none of this site's sources dates the next one. Austin's $9,019 is the 2025 tax year and assumes a filed homestead, after which the appraised value can rise no more than 10% a year, and it holds only for an address inside the City and Austin ISD. Getting in differs too: an Ottawa buyer owes $9,155 CAD in Ontario land transfer tax on the benchmark, and a Texas buyer owes none.
Better here
- There were 21 homicides in 2025 across the Ontario part of the metro, 1.59 per 100,000, against 51 in Austin at about 5.1.
- Mortgage, property tax and insurance come to about $3,350 CAD a month on the July 2026 benchmark, roughly 39% of the city's 2020 median household income, against about 54% in Austin.
- OHIP covers physician and hospital care whoever employs you, where Texas had the highest uninsured rate of the fifty states in 2024, 16.7%.
- Transit carried 11.2% of commuters in the 2021 census and 8.5% walked or cycled, against 3.0% and 4.1% in Austin in 2024, and OC Transpo ran 70.6 million trips in 2025 against CapMetro's 26,283,400.
- Property tax works out to 0.83% of market value for 2026, $5,262 CAD a year on the benchmark, against an effective 1.61% on Austin's median house for the 2025 tax year.
- July averages 21.2 C on the 1991-2020 normals, against 29.9 C in Austin, where the same normals count 28.7 days a year at or above 100F (37.8 C).
Worse here
- Regional unemployment was 6.8% in July 2026 against 3.7% in the Austin metro, and Budget 2025 announced about 28,000 more federal public service cuts by 2029.
- January averages -10.0 C on a 231.9 cm snow normal, the coldest January mean of the fourteen cities this site compares, against 11.2 C and 0.5 cm in Austin.
- Income tax on $100,000 is about $21,930 CAD for 2025 against $13,449 USD of federal tax in Austin, sales tax is 13% HST against 8.25%, and the top combined rate is 53.53% against 37%.
- A buyer owes $9,155 in Ontario land transfer tax on the July 2026 benchmark, where Texas has no transfer tax.
- 4.4 million Ontarians were projected to be without a family doctor by 2026, and the replacement Civic campus promised for 2028 had not begun construction.
- The violent crime rate for the Ontario part of the metro has risen every year since 2021, from 744 to 813.79 per 100,000 in 2025, while Austin's FBI-definition violent offenses fell 10% in 2025.
Choose Ottawa if
- you want health coverage that comes with residency and survives a layoff
- you want transit to be a real option for part of the week now rather than a light rail line due in 2033
- you are raising children and want French schooling to be an ordinary option
- you want a home that costs about 39% of local median income to hold rather than about 54%, and can take a January at -10.0 C for it
The Ottawa guide · Neighbourhoods · Ottawa rent vs buy · Ottawa mortgage calculator
Better here
- Metro unemployment was 3.7% in July 2026 against 6.8% in Ottawa-Gatineau, on 1,421,700 nonfarm jobs growing 1.7% on the year.
- Texas levies no income tax, so $100,000 pays $13,449 USD in federal tax for 2025 and $13,170 for 2026, against about $21,930 CAD in Ottawa.
- January averages 11.2 C with 0.5 cm of snow a year on the 1991-2020 normals, against -10.0 C and 231.9 cm in Ottawa.
- A buyer pays no transfer tax, where an Ottawa buyer owes $9,155 CAD on the July 2026 benchmark, and the 7.03% rate of 24 September 2026 is fixed for thirty years rather than renewed after five.
- Austin-Bergstrom handled 21,666,852 passengers in 2025 against 4.9 million at Ottawa, and average weekly wages in the metro were $1,957 in the first quarter of 2026 against $1,654 nationally.
- Violent offenses on the FBI's definitions fell 10% in 2025 to 4,221, about 421 per 100,000, and 21% over three years.
Worse here
- There were 51 homicides in 2025, about 5.1 per 100,000, against 21 and 1.59 in the Ontario part of the Ottawa metro.
- Mortgage, property tax and insurance come to about $4,041 USD a month on the August 2026 median, roughly 54% of the city's 2024 median household income against 39% in Ottawa, on a home at the same 6.2 times income.
- Property tax on the median house is $9,019 a year for the 2025 tax year with a homestead, an effective 1.61%, and $11,460 without one, against 0.83% of market value in Ottawa.
- Texas had the highest uninsured rate of the fifty states in 2024, 16.7%, and in August 2026 was one of ten states that have not expanded Medicaid.
- Only 3.0% of workers commuted by transit in 2024 and 57.5% drove alone, and light rail's first 9.8 miles are not due to carry passengers until 2033.
- 2023 had 80 days at or above 100F (37.8 C), and Winter Storm Uri left more than 40% of Austin Energy's customers without power in February 2021.
Choose Austin if
- you want a labor market at 3.7% unemployment in technology, chip making, state government or the University of Texas
- you want an 11.2 C January instead of -10.0 C and can plan a summer around days at 100F
- you have employer health insurance you trust and would rather pay property tax on a house than provincial income tax on a salary
- you earn well above the local median, where no state income tax is worth more each year than the $9,019 property tax on the median house costs
The Austin guide · Neighborhoods · Austin rent vs buy · Austin mortgage calculator
Ottawa or Austin, in short
Is Ottawa or Austin cheaper to live in?
Ottawa to own, once each bill is held against its own city's pay, because the currencies do not convert here. The homes cost the same multiple of income, about 6.2 times: $634,000 CAD against Ottawa's 2020 median household income of $102,000 CAD, and $560,000 USD against Austin's 2024 median of $90,430 USD. An Ottawa owner pays about $3,350 CAD a month on mortgage, property tax and insurance, roughly 39% of that income, and an Austin owner about $4,041 USD, roughly 54%, because the mortgage rate is 7.03% against 4.34% and the property tax $9,019 a year against $5,262 CAD. Renting is close: a two-bedroom averaged $1,916 CAD in October 2025 and $1,812 USD in August 2026, about 23% and 24% of each city's median household income. Austin takes less income tax, $13,449 USD on $100,000 for 2025 against about $21,930 CAD, and less sales tax, 8.25% against 13%, and an Ottawa buyer funds $9,155 of land transfer tax at closing.
Is Ottawa or Austin safer?
Ottawa on homicide, the one count that crosses the border, though it is a count for the Ontario part of the metro against one for the City of Austin. Ottawa's recorded 21 homicides in 2025, 1.59 per 100,000, down from 27 in 2024; Austin recorded 51, about 5.1 per 100,000, down from 66, though APD's assistant chief put the year at 55. The other rates are different instruments. Ottawa's violent rate of 813.79 per 100,000 counts every violent Criminal Code violation, including common assault, while Austin's 421 is murder, rape, robbery and aggravated assault from the FBI's counts, divided by the Census estimate and still open to revision. Property crime, 2,834.59 per 100,000 against 3,093, is defined differently as well. Statistics Canada put Ottawa's Crime Severity Index at 50.61 in 2025 against a national 75.0; American cities have no equivalent. Ottawa's violent rate has risen every year since 2021; Austin's violent offenses fell 10% in 2025.
Which has the better climate, Ottawa or Austin?
Austin in winter and Ottawa in summer, and Ottawa holds the cold end of this site's range. January averages 11.2 C in Austin with 0.5 cm of snow a year, against -10.0 C and 231.9 cm in Ottawa, the coldest January mean of the fourteen cities compared, and an Ottawa owner heats from October to April. July averages 21.2 C in Ottawa against 29.9 C in Austin, the second-warmest July mean of the fourteen behind Dallas, where the normals count 28.7 days a year at or above 100F (37.8 C) and 2023 had 80. Precipitation is nearly level, 929.8 mm against 921 mm. Ottawa's hazards are freezing rain, Ottawa River flooding as in 2017 and 2019, the May 2022 derecho and wildfire smoke; Austin's are flash floods on its creeks, drought on the Highland Lakes and the rare hard freeze, like February 2021, when ERCOT cut power across the state grid.
What happens to my health care if I move from Ottawa to Austin?
Coverage stops coming with residency and starts coming with a job or a purchase. In Ottawa, OHIP pays for physician and hospital care with nothing due at the point of use after a residency wait for newcomers, and an employer plan matters for prescriptions, dental and vision; the problem is access, with 4.4 million Ontarians projected to be without a family doctor by 2026. In Austin you need an employer or marketplace plan, Medicare or Medicaid, with the premium, deductible and copay that come with it. Texas is one of the ten states that have not expanded Medicaid and had the highest uninsured rate of the fifty states in 2024, 16.7%; the City of Austin's was 13.0%. Dell Seton Medical Center, the teaching hospital of UT's Dell Medical School, is the region's only adult Level I trauma center, with St. David's and Baylor Scott & White alongside. This site verified no wait time figure for either city.
Where the figures come from
Housing figures are the ones behind each city's calculators, dated on those pages. The rest are listed here with the date they were retrieved. See the methodology for how facts, estimates and opinion are kept apart.
- Census Profile, 2021 Census of Population: Ottawa, City (CSD) and Ottawa-Gatineau (Ontario part) · Statistics Canada · retrieved Supports: population.city (2021 count), Five-year growth, Median household income, Transit commute share, Walk and cycle commute share
- Census Profile, 2021 Census of Population: Ottawa-Gatineau (CMA) · Statistics Canada · retrieved Supports: population.metro (2021 count), population.growthPct5y (CMA)
- Population estimates, July 1, by census subdivision, 2021 boundaries (table 17-10-0155-01) · Statistics Canada · retrieved Supports: City population
- Population estimates, July 1, by census metropolitan area and census agglomeration, 2021 boundaries (table 17-10-0148-01) · Statistics Canada · retrieved Supports: Metro population
- Crime severity index and weighted clearance rates, Canada, provinces, territories and Census Metropolitan Areas (table 35-10-0026-01) · Statistics Canada · retrieved Supports: Crime Severity Index, Crime trend
- Police-reported Crime Severity Index and crime rate, by census metropolitan area, 2025 · Statistics Canada, The Daily · retrieved Supports: Crime Severity Index, crime.propertyRatePer100k (all-crime rate context)
- Incident-based crime statistics, by detailed violations, Canada, provinces, territories, CMAs (table 35-10-0177-01) · Statistics Canada · retrieved Supports: Violent crime rate, Property crime rate, Homicides, Crime trend
- Ottawa crime rate increases in 2025, remains above Ontario average · Yahoo News Canada (Ottawa Police Service KPI report to the Police Services Board, January 26, 2026) · retrieved Supports: crime.index (OPS city CSI 55.8)
- Canadian Climate Normals 1991-2020, Ottawa Macdonald-Cartier Int'l A · Environment and Climate Change Canada · retrieved Supports: January mean, July mean, Annual precipitation, Annual snowfall
- Canadian Climate Normals 1981-2010, Ottawa CDA · Environment and Climate Change Canada · retrieved Supports: Sunshine hours
- Labour force characteristics by census metropolitan area, three-month moving average, seasonally adjusted (table 14-10-0459-01) · Statistics Canada · retrieved Supports: Unemployment rate, Labour market
- Labour Force Survey, July 2026 · Statistics Canada, The Daily · retrieved Supports: economy.unemploymentPct (Canada and Ontario comparison)
- Federal government to cut another 28,000 public service jobs by 2029 · CTV News Ottawa · retrieved Supports: Labour market
- Federal Government Jobs in Ottawa: 2026 Hiring Guide (citing Public Service Commission counts at March 31, 2025) · Via Ottawa · retrieved Supports: economy.note (NCR public servant count)
- 2025 and 2026 Combined Federal and Ontario Tax Rates Including Surtaxes · TaxTips.ca · retrieved Supports: Top marginal income tax, Income tax on $100,000
- Ontario Health Premium · TaxTips.ca · retrieved Supports: Income tax on $100,000
- 2025 Non-Refundable Personal Tax Credits, Base Amounts · TaxTips.ca · retrieved Supports: Income tax on $100,000
- Recap: February 12, 2026 Transit Committee · OC Transpo · retrieved Supports: Transit ridership
- OC Transpo sees drop in ridership to start 2026 · CTV News Ottawa · retrieved Supports: transit.ridershipNote (early 2026)
- A transformational year: Ottawa Airport Authority reports 2025 results · Ottawa International Airport Authority · retrieved Supports: Airport passengers
- More Than Four Million Ontarians Will Be Without a Family Doctor by 2026 · Ontario College of Family Physicians · retrieved Supports: Health care
- New Ottawa Civic hospital opening likely delayed by years, says project consultant · CBC News · retrieved Supports: Health care
- Annual Estimates of the Resident Population for Incorporated Places in Texas: April 1, 2020 to July 1, 2025 (SUB-EST2025) · US Census Bureau · retrieved Supports: City population, Five-year growth, Violent crime rate, Property crime rate, Homicides, Character
- Annual Resident Population Estimates and Components of Change for Metropolitan and Micropolitan Statistical Areas and Their Counties: April 1, 2020 to July 1, 2025 (CBSA-EST2025-ALLDATA) · US Census Bureau · retrieved Supports: Metro population, Five-year growth, Character
- Crime Data Explorer summarized agency data, Austin Police Department (TX2270100): violent crime, property crime and homicide, 2021-2025 · FBI · retrieved Supports: Violent crime rate, Property crime rate, Homicides, Crime trend
- NIBRS Group A Offense Crimes (Austin Police Department open data, updated 14 September 2026) · City of Austin Open Data · retrieved Supports: Violent crime rate, Property crime rate, Homicides, Crime trend
- Austin's crime dropped below pre-pandemic highs in 2025 · KUT Radio, Austin's NPR Station · retrieved Supports: Homicides, Crime trend
- US Climate Normals 1991-2020, station USW00013958 Austin Camp Mabry (Access Data Service) · NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information · retrieved Supports: January mean, July mean, Annual precipitation, Annual snowfall, Climate normals, Climate hazards, Character, January 52.2F, July 85.8F and August 86.5F from the monthly series, and annual mean 70.0F, precipitation 36.25 in, snowfall 0.2 in and the counts of days at 90F and 100F and nights at freezing from dataset=normals-annualseasonal-1991-2020 for the same station
- US Climate Normals 1991-2020, station USW00013904 Austin-Bergstrom International Airport (Access Data Service) · NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information · retrieved Supports: Climate normals
- Global Historical Climatology Network daily summaries, Austin Camp Mabry (USW00013958), 1938-2026 · NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information · retrieved Supports: Climate hazards, 80 days at or above 100F in 2023 and 45 in a row from 8 July to 21 August, 90 in 2011 with a 27-day run, 112F on 5 September 2000 and 28 August 2011, 6.4 in of snow on 14 and 15 February 2021, 7F on 16 February 2021 and 4F on 23 December 1989, 5.20 in on 25 May 2015
- Global Historical Climatology Network daily summaries, Austin-Bergstrom International Airport (USW00013904), February 2021 · NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information · retrieved Supports: Climate hazards
- Average Annual Sunshine in US Cities · Current Results (NCDC Comparative Climatic Data, 1961-1990) · retrieved Supports: Sunshine hours
- This Holiday Weekend Marks The 40th Anniversary Of Austin's 1981 Memorial Day Flood · KUT Radio, Austin's NPR Station · retrieved Supports: Climate hazards
- October 30-31, 2013 Halloween Flash Flood Event · National Weather Service, Austin/San Antonio · retrieved Supports: Climate hazards
- Lower Onion Creek Flood Mitigation Buyout Project Gets Kudos from Homeowners · FEMA · retrieved Supports: Climate hazards
- 2015 Memorial Day Weekend Flooding, 23 to 24 May 2015 (Weather Event Summary) · National Weather Service, Austin/San Antonio · retrieved Supports: Climate hazards
- Tornado outbreak and floods of May 23 to 26, 2015 (Wimberley homes destroyed, Shoal Creek on May 25) · Wikipedia · retrieved Supports: Climate hazards
- National Weather Service releases new report on deadly Central Texas floods · KXAN Austin (via Yahoo News) · retrieved Supports: Climate hazards
- 2021 Winter Storm Uri After-Action Review, Findings Report · City of Austin and Travis County · retrieved Supports: Climate hazards
- February 2021 Winter Storm-Related Deaths, Texas (mortality surveillance report) · Texas Department of State Health Services · retrieved Supports: Climate hazards
- The Timeline and Events of the February 2021 Texas Electric Grid Blackouts · The University of Texas at Austin Energy Institute · retrieved Supports: Climate hazards
- Highland Lakes and Colorado River · Lower Colorado River Authority · retrieved Supports: Climate hazards
- Most LCRA agricultural customers will go without Highland Lakes water in 2024 · Lower Colorado River Authority · retrieved Supports: Climate hazards
- Drought persists in Central Texas, Water Management Plan under review · Community Impact · retrieved Supports: Climate hazards
- Water Supply Operations · Lower Colorado River Authority · retrieved Supports: Climate hazards
- ACS 2024 1-year tables B08301 and B19013 for Austin city and the Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos MSA · Census Reporter API (US Census Bureau ACS) · retrieved Supports: Median household income, Transit commute share, Walk and cycle commute share, Character
- ACS 2024 1-year table B27001 (health insurance coverage) for the 50 states, DC, the US, Travis County and Austin city · Census Reporter API (US Census Bureau ACS) · retrieved Supports: Health care, Character
- Unemployment Rate in Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos, TX (MSA), AUST448UR and AUST448URN · FRED, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (BLS LAUS data) · retrieved Supports: Unemployment rate
- All Employees: Total Nonfarm in Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos, TX (MSA), AUST448NA · FRED, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (BLS CES data) · retrieved Supports: Labour market
- Austin Area Economic Summary · US Bureau of Labor Statistics · retrieved Supports: Unemployment rate, Main sectors, Labour market
- Major Employers · Opportunity Austin (Austin Chamber of Commerce) · retrieved Supports: Main sectors, Labour market, Health care
- City Sales and Use Tax (city rate table) · Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts · retrieved Supports: Sales tax
- Transit Sales and Use Tax (Austin MTA, effective July 1, 1985) · Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts · retrieved Supports: Sales tax
- Sales and Use Tax · Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts · retrieved Supports: Sales tax
- Texas Tax Rates & Rankings · Tax Foundation · retrieved Supports: Top marginal income tax, Income tax on $100,000, Tax notes, Character
- 2025 Tax Brackets and Federal Income Tax Rates · Tax Foundation · retrieved Supports: Top marginal income tax, Income tax on $100,000
- 2026 Tax Brackets and Federal Income Tax Rates · Tax Foundation · retrieved Supports: Top marginal income tax, Income tax on $100,000
- Property Tax Exemptions · Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts · retrieved Supports: Tax notes
- Voters OK property tax breaks for Texas homeowners, businesses · The Texas Tribune · retrieved Supports: Tax notes
- Austin voters reject Proposition Q, a tax rate increase to fund city services · KUT Radio, Austin's NPR Station · retrieved Supports: Tax notes
- CapMetro (citing the APTA Transit Ridership Reports, Q4 2025 and Q2 2026) · Wikipedia · retrieved Supports: Transit system, Transit ridership, Character
- CapMetro Rail (Red Line: Leander to Downtown, 32 miles, 10 stations) · Wikipedia · retrieved Supports: Transit system
- What's on track and behind schedule with Austin's transit expansion nearly 6 years later · KUT Radio, Austin's NPR Station · retrieved Supports: Transit system, Transit ridership, Tax notes, Character
- How Austin's Project Connect went off the rails · The Texas Tribune · retrieved Supports: Transit ridership, Character
- Aviation Activity Report, Calendar Year 2025 vs 2024, Combined Terminals · Austin-Bergstrom International Airport · retrieved Supports: Airport passengers
- Austin-Bergstrom International Airport (annual passenger traffic table and history) · Wikipedia · retrieved Supports: Airport passengers
- Status of State Medicaid Expansion Decisions · KFF · retrieved Supports: Health care
- Dell Seton Medical Center · Wikipedia · retrieved Supports: Health care
- Dell Seton Medical Center at The University of Texas · Ascension Seton · retrieved Supports: Health care
- About St. David's HealthCare · St. David's HealthCare · retrieved Supports: Health care
- Building World-Class Health Care in Austin · Michael & Susan Dell Foundation · retrieved Supports: Health care
- Austin ISD Board approves 24 state-mandated turnaround plans, school consolidation and programmatic reassignments · Austin Independent School District · retrieved Supports: Education
- District Demographics · Austin Independent School District · retrieved Supports: Education
- Austin ISD enrollment dips as transportation costs rise · Austin Current · retrieved Supports: Education, Character
- Austin ISD loses 3,000 students amid school closures and budget crisis · KUT Radio, Austin's NPR Station · retrieved Supports: Education, Character
- UT Sets All-Time Highs for Enrollment and Student Performance · UT News, The University of Texas at Austin · retrieved Supports: Education
- MLS® Home Price Index: Ottawa Real Estate Board, July 2026 · Canadian Real Estate Association / Ottawa Real Estate Board · retrieved Supports: Composite MLS® HPI benchmark of $634,000 in July 2026, down 0.5% year over year, Single-family benchmark of $725,000, up 0.7% year over year, Townhouse and row benchmark of $542,500, down 5.1% year over year, Apartment benchmark of $385,500, down 5.2% year over year, 1,325 sales and 4,678 active listings in July 2026
- Rental Market Survey: Ottawa, average rent by bedroom type, October 2025 · Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation · retrieved Supports: Ottawa average purpose-built rents of $1,332 studio, $1,593 one-bedroom, $1,916 two-bedroom and $2,090 three-bedroom-plus, An overall average of $1,743 across 89,170 purpose-built units, Year-over-year increases of 3.4% on one- and two-bedroom units and 3.9% overall, Average rent of $2,320 in buildings completed in 2000 or later against $1,529 in buildings from before 1960
- Rental Market Statistics Summary: Ottawa (CV), October 2025 · Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation · retrieved Supports: City of Ottawa purpose-built vacancy rate of 2.9% across 86,550 units, City of Ottawa average rent of $1,741 and median rent of $1,675
- 2026 Tax Policy and Other Revenue Matters · City of Ottawa, Revenue Services · retrieved Supports: Ontario's last province-wide reassessment was completed in 2016 and municipalities rely on 2016 assessment values for the 2026 tax year, The average urban Ottawa home is assessed at $415,000, A 2026 net municipal increase of $184 on that home: $166 from the 3.75% budget increase and $18 from the multi-residential ratio change, The 2026 budget was approved on 10 December 2025 with a 3.75% overall municipal tax increase, Ottawa's 2025 average municipal taxes on a representative two-storey detached house were $5,490, the lowest of Ontario's ten largest municipalities
- Education property tax rates · Government of Ontario · retrieved Supports: The residential education tax rate of 0.153% of assessed value, unchanged since 2020
- Premium information for homeowner and small rental loans · Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation · retrieved Supports: Mortgage default insurance premium rates by loan-to-value
- Regulations amending the Insurable Housing Loan Regulations and the Eligible Mortgage Loan Regulations (SOR/2025-55) · Canada Gazette, Part II · retrieved Supports: The $1.5 million insured price cap, 30-year amortization for first-time buyers and new builds
- Minimum qualifying rate for uninsured mortgages · Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions · retrieved Supports: The qualifying rate of the contract rate plus two points, or 5.25%
- Interest rates charged for new and existing lending by chartered banks · Bank of Canada · retrieved Supports: The default mortgage rate of 4.34%, uninsured five-year-plus fixed, funds advanced May 2026
- Calculating Land Transfer Tax · Ontario Ministry of Finance · retrieved Supports: Provincial transfer tax brackets, The conditional 2.5% band
- Municipal Land Transfer Tax rates and fees · City of Toronto · retrieved Supports: Toronto municipal transfer tax brackets, First-time buyer rebate
- Residential rent increases · Government of Ontario · retrieved Supports: 2026 rent increase guideline of 2.1%, The 2018 occupancy exemption
- Retail Sales Tax · Government of Ontario · retrieved Supports: 8% retail sales tax on insurance premiums
- August 2026 Central Texas housing report · Unlock MLS · retrieved Supports: A median residential sale price of $560,000 in the City of Austin in August 2026, down 4.3% from August 2025, 844 homes sold, down 10.3%, 4,554 active listings and 4.6 months of inventory in the City of Austin, No split of the city figures by property type
- Zillow Home Value Index, all homes, middle tier, smoothed and seasonally adjusted, by city · Zillow Research · retrieved Supports: A typical home value of $497,418 for the city of Austin (region 10221) in August 2026, $516,564 in August 2025, so a fall of 3.7% over the year
- Zillow Home Value Index, single-family and condominium series, by city · Zillow Research · retrieved Supports: A typical single-family value of $527,943 in the city of Austin in August 2026, against $546,174 a year earlier, down 3.3%, A typical condominium value of $355,596 in the same month, against $375,347, down 5.3%, from the condominium file at https://files.zillowstatic.com/research/public_csvs/zhvi/City_zhvi_uc_condo_tier_0.33_0.67_sm_sa_month.csv
- Austin, TX average rent and rent trends · RentCafe / Yardi Matrix · retrieved Supports: An average Austin apartment rent of $1,641, down 2.25% from $1,678 a year earlier, updated 31 August 2026, Average rents of $1,287 studio, $1,421 one-bedroom, $1,812 two-bedroom and $2,405 three-bedroom
- Zillow Observed Rent Index, all homes plus multifamily, smoothed, by city · Zillow Research · retrieved Supports: An observed rent index of $1,586 for the city of Austin in August 2026, down 0.31% from $1,591 a year earlier
- Tax rates and truth-in-taxation rate table, all taxing units · Travis County Tax Assessor-Collector · retrieved Supports: 2025 adopted rates per $100: Travis County 0.375845, City of Austin 0.524017, Austin ISD 0.9252, Austin Community College 0.1034, Travis County Healthcare District (Central Health) 0.118023, 2026 adopted rates for Travis County (0.386210), the City of Austin (0.579948), ACC (0.103643) and Central Health (0.132863), and no adopted 2026 rate yet for Austin ISD
- 2026 exemption listing, Travis County taxing units · Travis Central Appraisal District · retrieved Supports: A residence homestead exemption of $140,000 for Austin ISD, with no local option, Local option homestead exemptions of 20% with a $5,000 minimum for Travis County, the City of Austin and the Travis County Healthcare District, and 1% with a $5,000 minimum for Austin Community College, The same exemptions in the 2025 listing, dated 25 July 2025
- Property tax rates · City of Austin Budget Office · retrieved Supports: A fiscal 2026 rate of 0.524017 per $100, maintenance and operations 0.410282 and debt service 0.113735, A fiscal 2027 rate of 0.579948 per $100, adopted on 12 August 2026
- Ordinance No. 20251120-006, reducing the fiscal 2025-2026 tax rate to the voter-approval rate · City of Austin · retrieved Supports: The Council adopted a rate above the voter-approval rate on 13 August 2025, which triggered an automatic election, Proposition Q did not win a majority at the 4 November 2025 election, The rate reduced to the voter-approval rate of $0.524017 per $100 under Tax Code section 26.07(e), effective 1 December 2025
- Notice about tax year 2026 property tax rates and impact statement · Austin Independent School District · retrieved Supports: A 2025 rate of 0.9252 per $100, maintenance and operations 0.8022 and debt service 0.1230, A proposed 2026 rate of 0.9184, maintenance and operations 0.7954 and debt service 0.1230
- Austin ISD claims victory in tax rate election · KUT News · retrieved Supports: Austin ISD's Proposition A passed on 5 November 2024 with about 58% of the vote, raising the district's rate 9.1 cents, from 0.8595 to 0.9505 per $100
- Travis County Prop A, affordable child care passes with majority of vote in 2024 election, unofficial results show · Community Impact · retrieved Supports: Travis County's Proposition A, a tax rate increase of 2.5 cents per $100 to fund child care, passed on 5 November 2024 with 59.43% of the vote, 321,043 to 219,141
- Truth-in-taxation rate table, all Travis County taxing units, 2022 to 2026 · Travis County Tax Assessor-Collector · retrieved Supports: Travis Central Health: a 2026 total rate of 0.132863 per $100, maintenance and operations 0.123603 and debt service 0.00926, against a no-new-revenue rate of 0.118633 and a voter-approval rate of 0.135195; a 2025 total rate of 0.118023, Travis County: a 2024 total rate of 0.344445 per $100 against a voter-approval rate of 0.319445, the 2.5 cents voters approved, Austin ISD: total rates of 0.8595 for 2023 and 0.9505 for 2024, and for 2026 a no-new-revenue and voter-approval rate but no total rate
- ACC approves new property tax rate for fiscal year 2025-26 · Austin Community College District · retrieved Supports: A 2025 rate of 0.1034 per $100
- Central Health board approves fiscal year 2027 tax rate and budget · Central Health (Travis County Healthcare District) · retrieved Supports: The Board of Managers adopted the fiscal 2027 tax rate on Wednesday, 9 September 2026, in a release dated 10 September; the rate itself is in the county's rate table above
- Fiscal year 2027 tax rate impact statement · Travis County · retrieved Supports: A county tax of $1,653.72 in 2025 on a $550,000 homestead after the 20% exemption, the same arithmetic as here, The 2025 rate set with the disaster calculation after the July 2025 floods, which the county said would come out for fiscal 2027
- Valuing property: the homestead cap and the circuit breaker limitation · Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts · retrieved Supports: A residence homestead's appraised value may not rise more than 10% a year, from the year after the owner first qualifies, A 20% annual limit on the appraised value of non-homestead property valued at $5 million or less, the circuit breaker, which expires on 31 December 2026
- Tax Code, Section 41.44: notice of protest · Texas Legislature · retrieved Supports: A protest must be filed by 15 May or the 30th day after the appraisal notice is delivered, whichever is later
- 2025 annual report · Travis Central Appraisal District · retrieved Supports: 210,038 property value appeals filed in 2025, A districtwide single-family median level of appraisal of 1.00
- School district property value study, 2024 final findings, Austin ISD · Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts · retrieved Supports: Austin ISD's local value found within the confidence interval of the state's estimate, so the appraisal district's values stand as market value
- 2026 market values on their way · Travis Central Appraisal District · retrieved Supports: A median residence homestead market value of $493,449 in Travis County for 2026, against $519,677 in 2025
- Annexation · City of Austin Planning Department · retrieved Supports: The City collects no property tax in limited-purpose areas, On full-purpose annexation an area's emergency services district tax may be eliminated
- Senate Bill 2, 86th Legislature: the Texas Property Tax Reform and Transparency Act of 2019 · Texas Legislature Online · retrieved Supports: The enrolled bill summary names Senate Bill 2 of 2019, by Bettencourt et al., the Texas Property Tax Reform and Transparency Act of 2019, with provisions taking effect from 1 January 2020 to 1 January 2022
- Property tax process post-Senate Bill 2 (2019): explanatory Q&A · Texas Municipal League · retrieved Supports: S.B. 2 lowers the multiplier in a city's voter-approval rate from 8 percent to 3.5 percent more maintenance and operations revenue, for nearly every Texas city, A city that adopts a rate above the 3.5 percent voter-approval rate must hold an automatic election on the November uniform election date, where before voters had to petition for one
- Truth in taxation · Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts · retrieved Supports: The voter-approval rate gives taxing units other than school districts and special taxing units about the previous year's operating revenue plus an extra 3.5 percent
- Geologic wonders of Texas: Central Texas · Bureau of Economic Geology, The University of Texas at Austin · retrieved Supports: In Austin the Balcones escarpment generally parallels MoPac (Loop 1): west of it the city is hilly and east of it relatively flat, Hard Lower Cretaceous limestones and dolostones form the hills to the west, and younger Upper Cretaceous rocks including clays the flatter ground to the east
- Houston Black: Texas state soil · Soil Science Society of America, with USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service figures · retrieved Supports: Houston Black, a smectite clay that shrinks when dry and swells when wet, is found in the Blackland Prairie along the route of Interstate 35 from north of Dallas to just south of San Antonio, Construction on it is often plagued by cracking from the shrinking and swelling, and building foundations need reinforcing
- Floodplain management · City of Austin Watershed Protection Department · retrieved Supports: NOAA's Atlas 14 rainfall study of 2018 found Central Texas getting heavier rain than previously thought, and the City is updating its floodplain maps from it, In November 2019 the City based its development regulations on the current FEMA 500-year floodplain instead of the 100-year floodplain, pending completion of the updated maps; the maps are on ATXFloodPro
- Flood zones · Federal Emergency Management Agency · retrieved Supports: The Special Flood Hazard Area is the land flooded by the 1-percent-annual-chance flood, the base or 100-year flood; the ground between it and the 500-year flood is a moderate-risk zone
- Understanding flood risk: real estate, lending and insurance professionals · Federal Emergency Management Agency · retrieved Supports: Federally regulated or insured lenders must require flood insurance for every building in a Special Flood Hazard Area with a federally backed loan
- Primary Mortgage Market Survey, 24 September 2026 · Freddie Mac · retrieved Supports: A 30-year fixed-rate mortgage averaging 7.03%, up from 6.95% the week before and 6.30% a year earlier
- Texas homeowners insurance market overview · Texas Department of Insurance · retrieved Supports: A statewide average homeowners premium of $3,489 a year, from the Texas Statistical Plan for Residential Risks, Hail as the largest cause of paid homeowners losses in every year from 2016 to 2025 except 2021
- Texas homeowners insurance · NerdWallet · retrieved Supports: An average Austin premium of $4,250 a year and a Texas average of $5,910, for $500,000 of dwelling cover
- How much is homeowners insurance in Austin, TX? · Insure.com · retrieved Supports: An average Austin premium of $2,698 a year for $300,000 of dwelling cover, $100,000 of liability and a $1,000 deductible, updated 27 May 2026
- Renters insurance in Texas · NerdWallet · retrieved Supports: An average Austin renters premium of $136 a year for $30,000 of personal property
- Monthly homeowners' or condominium association fee, table B25143, 2024 American Community Survey 1-year estimates, Austin city · United States Census Bureau · retrieved Supports: A median monthly association fee of $76 among Austin owner-occupied units that pay one, 88,975 of 199,801 owner-occupied units, or 44.5%, paying such a fee, from table B25142
- City of Austin utility rates and fees, effective 1 July 2026 · City of Austin · retrieved Supports: A residential solid waste charge of $23.80 a month plus $4.70 to $40.30 by cart size, Clean Community fees of $5.45 and $4.80 a month, charged to every residential customer, A transportation user fee of $21.80 a month for a single-family home
- Homebuyer resources: Down Payment Assistance · City of Austin Housing Department · retrieved Supports: Up to $40,000 in assistance for first-time buyers at or below 80% of median family income, A sales price of no more than $440,000, on a home inside Austin's full-purpose city limits
- Conforming loan limit values for 2026, by county · Federal Housing Finance Agency · retrieved Supports: A baseline one-unit conforming loan limit of $832,750 for 2026, which is the limit in Travis County
- Annual estimates of the resident population for incorporated places, 2020 to 2025 · United States Census Bureau, Population Estimates Program · retrieved Supports: A population of 1,002,632 for Austin on 1 July 2025, against 961,855 at the 2020 census
- 2025 Gazetteer files: places, Texas · United States Census Bureau · retrieved Supports: A land area of 325.013 square miles for Austin city, against 319.937 in the 2020 file