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Wilson County rural homes and land, sold by the road and the acre
Our home county. Rural homes, acreage, farms and ranches southeast of San Antonio, from Floresville to La Vernia and Stockdale.
Living in Wilson County
Wilson County rural homes and land sell by the road, the acre and the water, not by the subdivision. The county sits southeast of San Antonio. City buyers drive down on a Saturday, and city pricing logic stops working somewhere around the county line.
Most of what changes hands in Wilson County is some mix of land and home. It might be a house on a few acres, a hay pasture with a barn, or a brushy tract with a stock tank. Plenty of it has been in the same hands for decades.
Agriculture still shapes the county. Coastal Bermuda pasture and hay production cover a lot of the working land, and cattle run from one end of the county to the other. Wilson County is known as the Peanut Capital of Texas, and the Floresville Peanut Festival brings the county to town every October.
Water decides a lot of prices here. The San Antonio River runs through the western side of the county. Cibolo Creek crosses portions of it and meets the river below Floresville. Out in the country most homes draw from a private well and run on a septic system, and the Carrizo-Wilcox Aquifer sits under parts of the county.
Oil and gas are part of the picture too. Wilson County sits at the northern edge of the Eagle Ford Shale trend, so whether the minerals convey is a question on almost every land sale.
Talk to us about Wilson County
How we work Wilson County
We're James Peterson ALC and Barbara Peterson, and we work as Texas Ranch & Home. We're both real estate brokers, and we own the United Country Real Estate franchise in Floresville. It's the only franchise operating in Floresville, and our office sits on our own ranch at 1891 State Highway 97 E.
Wilson County is home base. Over 30 years we've sold roughly 2,000 properties across five South Texas counties, and ten of them sold for over $1,000,000. The same approach runs on a rural home under $300,000 and on a ranch well above that.
We split the work the way Wilson County property splits. James leads land and acreage under the UC Ranch Properties name: farms, ranches, hunting tracts and horse property. He's an Accredited Land Consultant, certified to conduct broker price opinions, and a licensed drone pilot.
Barbara leads rural homes, in town and in the subdivisions and small communities around them. She's certified in probate transactions and knows VA loans and Texas Veterans Land Board financing. She's also a U.S. Army veteran who separated as a Major after over 14 years of service.
On a Wilson County listing the work starts on the ground. James drives the property with the owner, in our four-seater RTV when the place calls for it. He looks at the entrance, the fences and the water. Then he works out how much of the acreage a buyer can actually use. See how we price the whole property before anybody talks about a list price.
Most sellers we meet here are holding three numbers at once: the appraisal district value, an online estimate and what the neighbor supposedly got per acre. The appraisal district number is not a pricing strategy. A property four miles away can have completely different access and water, so its price per acre doesn't transfer to yours.
Wilson County towns, roads and communities
Wilson County isn't carved into neighborhoods. It's carved by town, by road and by what the land is for. Here's how the county breaks down in the conversations we have with buyers and sellers.
Floresville
Floresville is the largest town in Wilson County and the seat of county government. US-181 runs from Floresville into San Antonio, and State Highway 97 runs out toward Pleasanton and Stockdale. In-town homes, newer neighborhoods on the edges and acreage outside the city limits all sell around Floresville. Read more about rural homes and land in Floresville.
La Vernia
La Vernia sits in northern Wilson County where US-87 meets FM 775. It's the first Wilson County town on the US-87 corridor out of San Antonio. Buyers ask about La Vernia ISD by name, and planned communities like Woodbridge Farms sit a short drive from rural tracts on county roads. See what buying and selling looks like around La Vernia.
Stockdale
Stockdale is in the southeastern part of the county, further down US-87 toward Karnes City. It has more of an agricultural character than Floresville or La Vernia, and it has its own school district, Stockdale ISD. Here's more on rural property around Stockdale.
Poth, Sutherland Springs, Nixon and Falls City
Poth sits roughly 10 miles south of Floresville along US-181, and it has its own district in Poth ISD. Sutherland Springs is an unincorporated community on the San Antonio River corridor, known for river bottom land and mature oaks. Nixon sits on the Wilson-Gonzales County line in the southeast. Falls City sits in the southwest corner near the Karnes County border.
The smaller Wilson County communities get less search traffic than Floresville and La Vernia, and the market around them leans toward pasture, brush and working ranch land. We wrote a longer guide to Poth, Nixon and Sutherland Springs for buyers who are flexible on location.
Wilson County property types, and what moves the price
Wilson County covers every price band and most kinds of rural property. On any given week the mix looks something like this:
- Homes in Floresville and the other towns, close to groceries and services.
- Rural homes on a few acres, usually on a private well and septic.
- Planned communities with deed restrictions and an association, such as Woodbridge Farms near La Vernia.
- Hay pasture, farmland and working cattle ranches, often under agricultural valuation.
- Brushy hunting and recreational tracts with stock tanks and senderos.
- River and creek land along the San Antonio River and Cibolo Creek, where the floodplain map matters.
What moves the price out here is what a buyer can do with the property. Road frontage and legal access move the number first. Water, usable acreage and tax status move it after that, often more than the house does.
Agricultural valuation comes up on almost every land sale in the county. In Texas, land usually needs five of the preceding seven years of qualifying use to qualify. Applications to the Wilson County Appraisal District are due April 30 each year. A new owner who changes the use can owe rollback taxes, so the plan for the land matters before closing. Here's what the April 30 ag deadline means for a buyer or a seller.
We don't publish a county median on this page. A median can't tell you what your road, your well or your fence line is worth. Plenty of Wilson County listings sit on the market, and most of the time the cause is the first price, not the market.
Getting around Wilson County
US-181 and US-87 are the two roads most Wilson County buyers measure their week by. US-181 runs from San Antonio down through Floresville and on to Poth. US-87 runs southeast from San Antonio through La Vernia and on toward Stockdale.
The road you'll drive most often narrows the search. Buyers headed to San Antonio's south side tend to look along US-181, and buyers headed to the east and northeast sides tend to look along US-87. Before you write an offer, drive your real commute from the property at the hour you'd actually drive it.
Wilson County towns keep their own traditions. Floresville holds the Peanut Festival every October, La Vernia runs an annual cattle drive through town, and Stockdale has its Watermelon Jubilee.
Rural services vary by road. Internet is usually solid in town and uneven on the edges of the county. Specialty medical care usually means a drive toward San Antonio. Check the specific property before you count on either one.
Talk to us about Wilson County rural homes and land
Buying or selling Wilson County rural homes and land starts with the property itself. Call James Peterson ALC at (210) 740-1295 about land, farms, ranches and acreage. Call Barbara Peterson at (210) 540-6487 about rural homes. Or send us a message about your Wilson County property and tell us the road it's on.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is rural land in Wilson County zoned?
Outside the limits of incorporated towns like Floresville and La Vernia, Wilson County has no governmental zoning. That doesn't mean anything goes. Deed restrictions can still limit what you build or keep on a property. Land near a town can also sit inside its extraterritorial jurisdiction, where subdividing goes through the city. We check both before you plan around a use.
Where does rural Wilson County get its water?
Most rural Wilson County homes draw from a private water well, and the Carrizo-Wilcox Aquifer sits under parts of the county. Homes inside the towns are more likely to be on a public system. On a rural purchase, get a well yield test and a water quality test from a licensed well driller or pump contractor. A general home inspection doesn't cover either one.
How do I find out what my Wilson County property is worth?
Start with the property, not a county average. James walks or drives the whole place with you and looks at access, water, fencing and usable acreage. Then he prices the land, the home and the improvements. He's an Accredited Land Consultant and certified to conduct broker price opinions. You get the number the market supports and the reasoning behind it.
Do you work the smaller communities, like Poth and Sutherland Springs?
Yes. We work the whole county, from Poth and Sutherland Springs to Nixon and Falls City. Those areas get less attention online than Floresville and La Vernia. Their buyers are often land buyers, hunters and ranchers, and those buyers look in land networks as much as on home sites. We market to both.
Buying in Wilson County
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