Custom pool builder in Spicewood, Texas.
Spicewood straddles the Burnet and Travis county line, and which side of it your lot sits on decides who permits the pool.
Lots, soil and terrain in Spicewood.
There is no city here. ZIP 78669 is unincorporated and runs across Burnet County and Travis County, so we check the county on the appraisal record first. On the Travis side the pool permit comes from Travis County TNR Development Services, and review pauses until every comment is answered. On the Burnet side, Burnet County Development Services issues a $25 Class A building permit with no structural inspections and no published pool-specific permit. The LCRA covers both sides: a watershed permit only above 10,000 square feet of impervious cover, and septic authority within 2,000 feet of Lake Travis. Barton Creek Lakeside, the Reserve at Lake Travis and Paleface Ranch are gated with their own architectural review.
The soil series is named for the place. Spicewood soil is cobbly clay loam over dusky-red cobbly clay with slickensides, the shrink-swell signature, reaching hard limestone at roughly 27 to 52 inches. That is shallow rock under an expansive clay cap, and the geotechnical report decides how the shell is reinforced. Lots are large: half an acre to four acres in Barton Creek Lakeside, 7 to 20 acres on the ranch tracts Burnet County permits, and Pedernales-view acreage in Paleface Ranch and Travis Settlement. Windermere Oaks and Spicewood Beach run on small water-supply corporations and wells, the Spicewood Beach well failed in the 2011–12 drought, and septic is the norm.
Distance and water shape the work. Long driveways limit the equipment we can bring in, and a well-fed pool is sized and auto-filled with the well's output in mind. Lake lots in Barton Creek Lakeside and the Reserve ask for a vanishing edge and terraced decks. Barton Creek Lakeside and Windermere Oaks were built in the 1990s and 2000s, the age at which a first pool comes up for renovation.
- PermitsTravis County TNR (Travis side); Burnet County Development Services (Burnet side); check the county on the parcel first
- LCRAHighland Lakes Watershed Ordinance; septic authority within 2,000 ft of Lake Travis
- GroundSpicewood series: cobbly clay loam over expansive red clay, limestone at ~27–52″
- WaterSmall water-supply corporations and private wells; septic throughout
- ElectricPedernales Electric Cooperative
- Lots0.5–4 acres on the lake; 7–20-acre ranch tracts inland
Neighborhoods we work in
- Barton Creek Lakeside · guard-gated golf and Lake Travis coves
- Reserve at Lake Travis · gated lakefront with marina
- Lakecliff on Lake Travis · golf and lake lots
- Paleface Ranch / Paleface Homesteads · gated acreage with Pedernales views
- Travis Settlement · acreage near the lake
- Coves on Lake Travis / Travis Club · lakefront and ridge lots
- Windermere Oaks · gated Burnet-side airpark and lake lots
- Thomas Ranch · 2,200-acre master plan on the Pedernales
Custom pools we have built in Spicewood.
No completed Spicewood project is on the site yet; these three, on Hill Country ridges and a lakefront, are the closest work in kind.
Lakeside Glass
Lakefront pool with a dated spa → renovation: 360-degree vanishing-edge glass spa and fire bowls facing the water.
Hilltop Overlook
Steep fall from house to pool level → freeform vanishing edge below a covered terrace, reached by a stone stair.
Negative Edge Estate
Acreage behind a white modern house, long sightline → black-tile vanishing edge, raised spa, sunken fire lounge.
Pool builders for nearby communities.
The pages for the communities around Spicewood: Lake Travis, the Travis County shore; Lakeway, city permits, slope-weighted cover; Bee Cave, our office on Highway 71; Dripping Springs, Hays County, dark-sky rules.
Questions about Spicewood.
It depends on the county line. Travis County lots file a residential pool permit with Travis County TNR Development Services, with grading, septic, floodplain and balance-of-fill on the site plan. Burnet County publishes a $25 Class A building permit with no structural inspections and no pool-specific permit; we confirm current requirements with the county before quoting. Within 2,000 feet of Lake Travis the LCRA issues the septic permit.
Spicewood soil, the series named here, is cobbly clay loam over expansive red clay with limestone at roughly 27 to 52 inches. The shell is reinforced to the geotechnical report because the clay moves and the rock does not. Lots run from half-acre coves in Barton Creek Lakeside to 20-acre ranch tracts, most on septic and many on wells, so equipment placement is driven by the drainfield and the well.
Projects start around $250,000; most fall between $300,000 and $600,000. Spicewood adds haul distance for every truck of gunite and tile, long electrical and water runs on acreage, a stiffened shell over expansive clay, a well-rated auto-fill, septic setbacks that move the equipment pad, and architectural review in the gated communities on the lake. A vanishing edge over a Barton Creek Lakeside cove adds structure.
Six to nine months is the base. Here the schedule moves with the county: a Travis County review that pauses until every comment is answered, an LCRA septic permit near the lake, HOA review in Barton Creek Lakeside or the Reserve, and the extra crew days that come from a long haul and a lot no concrete truck can reach without a pump.
