Ventana

Ventana is a master-planned community on the far west side of Fort Worth, off Jerry Dunn Parkway, south of Aledo Road and north of Dutch Branch. Homes went up starting around 2017 and are still going up — Perry, David Weekley, Trophy Signature, Meritage, Tri Pointe and American Legend have all built here — on lots that run mostly between 5,000 and 8,000 square feet, with trails, amenity centers and a good deal of open space between the sections.

It's Fort Worth ISD, with Rolling Hills Elementary inside the community. About 125 homes change hands here a year, at a median around $469,900, and there are 49 on the market as I write this.

I'm a Fort Worth broker and a Certified Residential Appraiser, and I live in a master-planned community myself, about fifteen minutes from here. Two things about Ventana are worth more to you than anything on the amenity list.

What homes here sell for

• Median close $469,900 on 2,545 square feet — about $195 per foot
• Median lot 6,273 square feet, ranging from 4,400 to 13,504
• Median 57 days on market at 97.0% of original list
• Closed prices ran $350,000 to $954,900; homes from 1,611 to 4,994 square feet
• Built 2017 to 2026, median year built 2024

Price per foot falls as houses get larger — correlation −0.417, which is strong and is the normal pattern in new construction, because a kitchen, a roof and a foundation don't scale with square footage. A 4,000-square-foot plan will not command the same rate as a 2,000-square-foot one, and any per-foot number you're quoted needs to come from your size band.

The first-year cost, measured

Here is the number I'd want you to have before you sign anything.

Buying new costs about $200 a foot. Selling the same house two to four years later brings about $189. That gap is roughly 6%, and it holds up statistically (p = 0.013).

On a 2,500-square-foot house that's about $27,500 of rate, before you've paid a commission or a title bill. It isn't that Ventana is a bad buy — it's that the new-home premium is real, you pay it once, and you don't get it back. If you're likely to move within four years, that number belongs in your math up front.

Notice also that the resales sell faster and concede less: 44 days at 97.5% of asking against 66 days at 96.1% for builder inventory. A three-year-old house with a yard already in and blinds already hung is competitive here, which is not true in every new community.

The tax bill you will actually get is not the one you see

Ventana's combined rate is 2.1891%: Tarrant County 0.1862, City of Fort Worth 0.67, Fort Worth ISD 1.0291, Tarrant Regional Water District 0.0265, Hospital District 0.165, College District 0.11228.

The good news first: no PID and no MUD — just the standard Fort Worth jurisdictions. On the west side, where PIDs are common in new communities and can add real money to a monthly payment, that's worth knowing.

Now the part that catches people. On a brand-new home, the appraisal district often has only assessed the land at the time you close. The improvement — the house — gets picked up in a later assessment cycle.

Homes that have been through a full assessment cycle pay about 2.11% of purchase price in annual tax, right in line with the nominal rate. Homes closing before the house has been assessed pay a small fraction of that. On the median Ventana home, full assessment is roughly $10,287 a year. On a $750,000 house it's about $16,400.

If your lender sets up escrow on a land-only tax figure, your payment will be wrong — and the correction arrives as a large escrow shortage plus a permanently higher monthly payment, usually twelve to twenty-four months in. Ask your lender to escrow on expected assessed value at the full rate, not on the seller's or builder's current tax figure. This is the single most common unpleasant surprise in new construction and it is entirely avoidable.

Homes are taking longer, but prices are holding

Price per foot has been essentially flat: $196 in 2023, $196 in 2024, $193 in 2025, $198 in 2026. Values here have held.

What has changed is patience. Median days on market went 48, 52, 62, 65 across those same four years. Homes take about two and a half weeks longer than they did, on unchanged pricing.

And only 18% of listings come off the market without selling, which is unusually low. Nearly everything that lists here trades. Ventana is a slower market than it was, not a weaker one — and nothing in the wider Fort Worth data suggests values are falling anywhere.

The practical stuff

Every home here carries an HOA, running about $960 a year. There is no PID and no MUD — confirm it for your specific parcel, but that's the pattern.

Ventana is Fort Worth ISD, with Rolling Hills Elementary inside the neighborhood. If you're also looking at Walsh, note that it's Aledo ISD — the district line matters more than the four miles between them.

Ventana files under a dozen MLS subdivision names — Ventana, Ventana Ph 1 through Ph 6a-2, Ventana Add. An automated estimate that searches one of them is valuing your house against a fraction of the neighborhood.

What I look at in a Ventana house

• Where the price sits against builder inventory. Forty-nine homes are active right now, and the builder can move incentives, rate buydowns and closing costs in ways you can't. That is your real competition.
• Your size band, not the neighborhood average. Price per foot falls sharply with size here, at a correlation of −0.417.
• The escrow figure. Confirm whether the improvement has been assessed, and what the payment looks like at full assessment.
• Drainage and grade. I can usually tell on a walk-through whether a lot is going to need work — and more importantly, when it's the builder's responsibility under the contract rather than yours. Worth asking before closing, not after.
• What the warranty actually covers, and when each phase of it expires. Most of what people assume is covered isn't.
• Which phase and which section. Lots range nearly three-fold, from 4,400 to 13,504 square feet.

If you're selling in Ventana

Almost everything that lists here sells, and homes two to four years old actually move faster than new ones — 44 days at 97.5% of asking.

The job is positioning against the builder rather than against your neighbors. Your house has a yard, window coverings, appliances and no construction timeline, and those are worth real money to a buyer comparing you against a dirt-start. Priced as if it were new, it sits. Priced as what it is — finished, immediate, and about 6% below the new-build rate — it sells quickly.

Buying or selling in Ventana

A 6% first-year premium you pay once, a tax bill that can more than double after you move in, and forty-nine builder homes competing with you on the way out.

That's a valuation problem before it's a marketing problem. Holding a Texas broker's license alongside a Certified Residential Appraiser certification is why I can tell you what a Ventana house is worth against the builder standing next to it.

Call or text (682) 207-4310, or send me a note.

Sales figures are medians from NTREIS listings and closed sales for the three years ending September 2026, reported in aggregate. HOA dues, tax rates, school attendance boundaries and market conditions change — confirm current figures and assignments for a specific property before relying on them.