Liberty Hill set to be Next Site of Austin Area Retail Boom

One of the Austin metro area’s fastest growing suburbs will be getting a new retail center, pending city approval.

Pohl Jensen, a firm that has been building in Central Texas since the 1970s, is heading up a 21.5-acre development in the Liberty Hill area, according to the Austin Business Journal. Sutton Natalie, the working name of the project, is going through various pre-development processes as the property is rezoned from agricultural to general commercial and retail.

The acreage set aside for the project is just southeast of the intersection of Hwy 29 and Butler Farms Boulevard. Sutton Natalie is a part of a 90-acre parent tract, which could see further residential development as the Austin suburb swells.

CEO and co-owner of Pohl Jensen, Jennifer Jensen, told the outlet that it could be up to a year before ground is broken. Pohl Jensen previously helped bring Target and Costco to the burgeoning suburb, and Jensen said 120,000 to 150,000 square feet of the development is earmarked for mixed retail use, which the outlet suggests could be used to build an H-E-B, a popular Texas grocery store.

Retail development is booming in the Texas Triangle, a region of the state which stretches north to Dallas, south to Houston, and west to San Antonio. Austin, the state’s capitol and home of “Silicon Hills,” sits a smidge to the east of the triangle’s center. According to an April report from CoStar, Dallas leads the nation in retail construction with 7 million square feet of retail space in the smoker. Houston comes in second, followed by Austin.

Demand has increased so much in the Austin metro specifically that real estate firms are launching dedicated divisions to meet it. Austin-based Riverside brought on ex-JLL broker Travis Robertson to lead their new retail brokerage for the region, formed in response to overwhelming demand. The Austin area is expected to see 1.5 million square feet of retail space open by the end of 2026.

Liberty Hill, once a small, quiet agricultural town, has seen population growth at a breakneck pace. Since the 2020 census pegged the population at around 3,700, Liberty Hill’s population has tripled.

— Hunter Cooke