Austin City Council last week approved the rezoning of a city block along West Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, clearing the way for two high-rise towers near the edge of downtown and within walking distance of the UT campus. The project, proposed by Rundog Real Estate Group, would replace the existing Jack Brown Cleaners, a Jimmy John’s, the Penthouse Apartments, and several parking lots with a 476-room hotel and a 287-unit multifamily building, both with ground-floor retail, according to the Austin Business Journal.
Residents of Judge’s Hill, the neighborhood south of MLK, opposed the rezoning, citing environmental concerns about the Jack Brown Cleaners site. A 2003 assessment found human carcinogens from chemical dry-cleaning solvents in the ground, according to an evaluation from environmental consultant Brad Snow. Jack Brown enrolled in the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality’s Voluntary Cleanup Program and received a certificate of completion in 2020. However, Snow noted that the commission never required the site to evaluate the possibility of toxic vapors migrating from soil into indoor air within future buildings.
Judge’s Hill resident Marisela Maddox told the Daily Texan she wanted the developer to conduct more testing or install a vapor barrier. Leah Bojo, who represents Rundog, wrote that the group completed all required testing and is “continuing to work with the neighbors on potential commitments to go above and beyond those requirements.”
The approval comes as Austin’s rental market continues one of the sharpest corrections of any major U.S. city. Average apartment rents peaked at about $1,726 in August 2022 and have since fallen to roughly $1,425, a decline of more than 17%. The vacancy rate has surged from under 4% in late 2021 to over 10%, placing Austin among the top five metro areas nationally for apartment oversupply. Zillow now puts Austin rents about 0.2% below the national average.
The decline has been driven by a building boom. From 2021 to 2023, the Austin metro permitted roughly 957 new apartments per 100,000 residents, nearly three times the rate of other major Texas cities. Much of that construction was enabled by local reforms under the HOME Initiative, which allowed up to three homes on single-family lots, cut minimum lot sizes by 68%, eliminated parking minimums, and created the Density Bonus 90 program that lets developers build taller in exchange for affordable units. At the state level, the 2025 Texas Legislature passed seven bipartisan housing bills loosening zoning and land-use restrictions, which Governor Abbott signed into law in August.
However, housing supply is slowing significantly. New apartment starts fell 60% in 2024, reaching a ten-year low. RealPage forecasts that demand will outpace supply again this year for the first time since 2021, and rent growth could turn positive by the end of the year.
