Sam Chapman
Articles by Sam Chapman
November 20, 2009
If you´re in real estate, you have to have a digital camera. You just do. You need a camera for photographing listings and fliers. You need a camera to take photos for your website or blog. So how is one supposed to decide on the best one to get and whether or not to have any accessories a...
November 19, 2009
Taking great digital photos is actually pretty easy as digital cameras have come so far. The technology has allowed people without a lot of photography background to take some really great digital photos.
Your first step to taking great digital photos is knowing the basics of your digital camera...
November 17, 2009
If you want to learn about how to take really good close-ups digital photos, you need to understand the macro mode setting on your digital camera. On what is usually a dial that changes photo settings, macro is usually indicated by a flower. Using the macro mode, you can get excellent close-ups of...
July 21, 2009
Austin, Texas is a wonderful place to live. People relocate to Austin for a lot of reasons. Most move to Austin for jobs, but many move to Austin for other reasons or for a combination of a job change and the lifestyle in Austin.
Over the last few years I have been compiling a list of things Au...
July 01, 2009
Many print newspapers are struggling and some have gone bankrupt. Revenue from ads is way down in many the classifieds sections of many newspapers has shrunk tremendously.
Think of what became available over time as means of communication. Way back, it was TV and radio. Later it was cable. Th...
June 25, 2009
Many real estate agents are very resistant to change and many have no clue about some of today´s technology. When I talk with some agents about blogs, their faces go blank. It gets even worse when I talk about Twitter, Facebook and text messaging. I´m not going to bother with any of thes...
May 28, 2009
Sam Chapman is an Austin REALTOR who has lived and worked in the Austin area since 1987. Sam enjoys working with people looking at Austin or Lake Travis real estate. He is also a very active volunteer in the community.
May 28, 2009
Sam Chapman is an Austin REALTOR® who has lived and worked in the Austin area since 1987. Sam enjoys helping people buy or sell Lake Travis homes and he enjoys volunteering in the community.
May 06, 2009
Austin makes it on a lot of lists and they are usually "best of" or "top places for..." and so on. Over the last several years I have compiled a list of lists of just what makes Austin such an attractive place to live.
Like everyone else, I realize that the economy is unhealthy now, but it has...
March 06, 2009
1) Austin, TX – Falconhead is about a 30-40 minute drive from downtown Austin. Austin is one of the most intelligent and most dynamic cities in the country. Called the Live Music Capital of the World, Austin is also very well known for its amazing live music.
2) Golf – Falconhead was laid out...
February 18, 2009
Cave Without a Name is worth a day trip from Austin. Just 11 miles west of Boerne, TX, Cave without a Name is just about two hours from the center of Austin. The tour of the cave isn´t long, but there are some huge rooms with amazing formations in the cave.
So the first thing you might be wonde...
February 18, 2009
Developed by Rotarian Chris Byrd and Founder and Executive Director of Knights of the Guild, Randall Parr, EAFK developed into an unprecedented character education program that would put Rotary ideals into the daily academics of mainstream K-8 education for the first time ever. The EAFK approach to...
February 17, 2009
After serving Lakeway and surrounding communities since 2000 Keller Williams Realty Lake Travis just moved to a brand new, state-of-the-art real estate market center at 1921 Lohman´s Crossing in Lakeway. The market center encompasses 15,000 square feet of triple A office space including 49 pr...
October 21, 2008
About 20-30 minutes west of downtown Austin, the subdivision of Lake Pointe is a wonderful neighborhood. There are a number of things that make Lake Pointe special. First is the location. Not far from Austin in the beginning of the Central Texas Hill Country, Lake Pointe residents can be in downt...
October 16, 2008
If you are considering building on Lake Travis and probably on many other lakes, there are some things you need to know. Lake Travis is west of downtown Austin, Texas around 45 minutes. Everything in this article will be specific to Lake Travis, but it may provide some things to think about for an...
October 05, 2008
For the last six years, I have had the privilege of being the Rotary Club of Lakeway – Lake Travis adviser to the Lake Travis High School (LTHS) Interact Club. Interact is Rotary International´s service club for young people ages 14 to 18. Interact clubs are sponsored by individual Rotary clubs, wh...
October 02, 2008
Hamilton Pool Preserve is a park west of Austin. It is an absolutely fabulous place to hike and observe what the power of water can do. The pool itself sits at the base of what must be a collapsed cave. Slabs of limestone line the pool both in and out of the water. There is usually a waterfall p...
September 30, 2008
If you live in Austin and have not visited the Congress Street Bridge, affectionately known as the bat bridge, you need to go. If you are visiting and the bats haven´t left for the winter, this is a must see for you too.
The Congress Street Bridge in downtown that crosses Lady Bird Lake i...
September 30, 2008
Westcave Preserve is a great place to tour on weekends. Westcave Preserve is the remains of a cave that had the ceiling collapse tens of thousands of years ago. Water falls from a creek into a huge grotto containing a pool of water around 25 feet deep. Lush ferns and moss cover areas fed by the c...
September 24, 2008
Have you evern driven through Dripping Springs, Texas? If you have, did you ever stop and think about the name and where it came from? Well, if you go to Dripping Springs, you can actually view the dripping springs. Read more about interesting town names in Texas.
September 15, 2008
Steiner Ranch is a large subdivision in the northwest Austin area. Nestled in the Central Texas Hill Country, Steiner Ranch has some great view as well as having Lake Austin to one side and Lake Travis within minutes.
August 26, 2008
The Lakeway City Park is a 64 acre park in the city of Lakeway, Texas. Free for Lakeway residents and open for a small fee for non-residents, the park has something for just about everyone.
The original park with an actual field and play equipment in Lakeway is Dragon Park. I used to take my ki...
August 25, 2008
Briarcliff is a waterfront community on Lake Travis around 45 minutes west of the downtown Austin area. This small city used to feel pretty far out from much of anything, but that has really changed. As Austin has grown to the west and new businesses have opened up, Briarcliff isn´t that far...
July 17, 2008
Spanish is a very exclusive, gated golf community around 30 minutes west of Austin in the small Hill Country city of Bee Cave. Sitting on 1,200 acres, but with only 400 home sites, Spanish Oaks gives people a sense of community, but with a degree of privacy. Some home sites have nice golf course vi...
July 02, 2008
Austin not well known for luxury real estate - yet, but there definitely is a market for luxury real estate in the Austin area. By luxury, I am specifically talking about single-family homes that sell for over $1 million. When talking about Austin, the area is a 5 county area that includes the Aus...
June 24, 2008
New water restrictions were announced today for communites south of Austin. San Marcos, New Braunfels San Antonio and parts of the southern Austin area and other communities draw water from the Edwards Aquifer. The Edwards is huge, but these cities and others pull huge amounts of water out of it. ...
June 24, 2008
OK, so Krause Springs isn't in Austin - technically it is in Spicewood but it is close. Krause Springs is an amazing place. West of Austin a little more than 30 miles, Krause Springs is a wonderful swimming hole. Krause Springs is actually a privately owned area owned by Elton and Jane Krause. O...
June 09, 2008
Flintrock Falls is a wonderful gated, colf community in Lakeway, TX just west of Austin. Hills, Lake Travis and golf are all around. Learn more about Flintrock Falls.
June 08, 2008
There is plenty to do in Austin, but what about recreation outside the city, but within a reasonable drive? There are plenty of places to visit.
If you want to stay relatively close to Austin, take a drive out Hamilton Pool road and visit Hamilton Pool Preserve. Formed when a cave partially col...
May 29, 2008
Author Sam Chapman has lived and worked in the Austin, TX area for 20 years and specializes in Austin real estate and LAke Travis real estate.
May 01, 2008
Sam Chapman has lived and worked in the Lake Travis and Austin area since 1987. Sam now specializes in helping buyers and sellers of Austin, Texas estate and Lake Travis real estate
November 27, 2007
Apache Shores is a rather eclectic subdivision in the hills near Lake Travis just west of Austin. With a couple of creeks carving valleys through the hills of Apache Shores and draining into Lake Austin, the topography is pretty dramatic. Going north on RR 620, you can be in north or central Austi...
November 02, 2007
That is a question anyone buying a home in the Austin area should be asking. It doesn’t matter whether or not you have kids because when you resell your house, most buyers will be concerned about schools.
So how do you define which schools are the best? You start by looking at the entire dist...
September 18, 2007
1) Location – Lakeway is about 40 minutes west of downtown on beautiful Lake Travis. Situated in the Central Texas Hill Country, Lakeway isn’t what most people picture when they think of Texas.
2) Lake Travis – all you need to do is look at the clear, blue-green water and you’ll immediately ...
September 10, 2007
On the north side of Lake Travis, just northwest of Austin, is Lago Vista. There is a lot of value in this small town. As other areas around Lake Travis become more developed, Lago Vista is looking more and more attractive. Check out eight reasons to love Lago Vista, Texas.
1. Highway 183A. T...
September 10, 2007
As more and more homes and businesses are built in the Central Texas area, the supply of water is a huge concern of mine. The lakes and aquifers can only sustain us so long without extensive conservation. As water becomes more scarce, it will become more expensive. So what can we do? Or should t...
September 10, 2007
My parents, just like many other people, are aging. My younger brother and I visited them a couple of months ago and decided to make some changes to make their house a little friendlier for them. As our population ages, many children of aging parents should do the same thing. Here is a list of ei...
August 24, 2007
I went to a very interesting meeting yesterday at which Joe Brown, founder of Milestone Mortgage, who walked us through the start and what he sees as the finish of the current lending crisis. The following comes from notes I took.
After the crash of the tech sector and 9-11, our economy was in a...
August 22, 2007
Anyone who has looked at Lake Travis real estate should have realized by now that the south shore is more expensive than the north shore. With some things changing locally the north shore is looking much more attractive these days.
Big change number one: the opening of Highway 183A. Access ...