Elon Musk has reportedly purchased thousands of acres of land so that he can build a town for employees outside of Austin, Texas.
Citizens of the town would have below-market rents and work for either Tesla, SpaceX, and The Boring Company, Musk’s tunnel and infrastructure business. Bastrop County Commissioner Mel Hamner told KXAN that he believes the houses will be offered as lease-to-buy options.
County deeds and land records indicate that entities tied to Musk have purchased at least 3,500 acres of land over the past three years, though local real-estate and land officials believe it may be as much as 6,000 acres. To purchase the land, Musk utilized at least four limited liability companies connected to his businesses or their offices, per The Wall Street Journal.
Musk has also used the purchased land to build a private compound in the area. The exact location and details of the compound are unknown, but those close to the situation say it is separate from the planned town.
The planned town is adjacent to the Boring and SpaceX facilities, but the short distance from Austin is also beneficial to the planned town’s location.
“You are on the west side of Bastrop, the east side of Austin. So it is very easy for people to commute,” stated Jacki Short, a realtor with Nik Shehu Property Group in Bastrop County, per KXAN.
Adena Lewis, the county’s director of tourism and economic development, believes the small size of Bastrop County appealed to Musk. “I think it’s the ability to work with folks on a direct level and not having tons of red tape,” Lewis said, per The Wall Street Journal.
Musk reportedly envisions a “Texas utopia” in Bastrop County, which is located roughly 35 miles outside of Austin, per The Wall Street Journal.
Certain amenities, such as a pool, outdoor gym and sports area, and collection of homes, have already been built at the site. The planned town’s name, Snailbrook, is related to Boring’s mascot of a snail; around the time of the Boring Company’s founding, Musk asked employees to build machines that moved “faster than a snail,” per The Wall Street Journal.
To be incorporated, a town requires at least 201 residents. Then, an application must be sent and approved by a county judge. At the time of publication, a spokeswoman for Bastrop County said no application had been received for Snailbrook.
Tesla recently announced that they are planning to spend $3.6 billion on a new factory outside of Sparks, Nevada, as previously reported by The Dallas Express. The company also announced it would expand manufacturing into Mexico with another factory in Nuevo Leon, a northern Mexican state that borders Texas, per The Dallas Express.