Fountain Hills · Buying a Home
Buying a Home in Fountain Hills
Someone who walks the houses with you, tells you what is wrong with them, and negotiates like it is her own money.
Settle this before you look at a single house
Fountain Hills is its own town. It was incorporated in 1989, it has its own council, and it is not part of Scottsdale in any way that matters to you as a buyer.
That means your children would attend Fountain Hills Unified School District #98, not Scottsdale Unified. The whole district is four schools: Little Falcons Preschool, McDowell Mountain Elementary, Fountain Hills Middle School and Fountain Hills High School. If schools are part of your decision, this is the single largest practical difference between buying here and buying across the Scottsdale line, and it is the one people discover latest.
Policing comes from a contract with the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office rather than a town force. The Fountain Hills Fire Department runs two stations. None of this is good or bad on its own. It is just different from what you are picturing if you think of this as a corner of Scottsdale.
Look at the lot before you look at the kitchen
I mean that literally, and it is the advice I give every buyer here. In a flat subdivision the house is the purchase. On a hillside the lot is at least half of it, and the lot is the half you cannot change later.
Walk the driveway and imagine backing out of it in the rain with a car you actually own. Count the steps from where a car stops to the front door, and count them again from the garage, because those are frequently different numbers.
Find out what sits below you and whether anything can be built there. An open outlook over protected land stays open. An outlook across a vacant downhill lot is borrowed, and the difference between those two is real money that no listing will point out to you.
Then look at the outdoor space and ask how much of it is genuinely flat and usable, as opposed to slope that has been landscaped to look intentional.
Find out whether there is an association at all
This surprises people coming from north Scottsdale, where an association is close to universal. A good deal of Fountain Hills sits in no association whatsoever.
FireRock, Adero Canyon, SunRidge Canyon and Eagle Mountain each carry their own dues, rules and character, and they are genuinely different from one another rather than variations on a theme. Adero Canyon backs onto the McDowell Sonoran Preserve with trail access from the community itself.
Outside those, you may be buying somewhere with no dues, no design review and no one to tell your neighbor what color to paint. Some buyers want exactly that and some are horrified by it. Either is a fine answer. Not knowing which one you bought is not, so I check it on every address before you get attached to a house.
The dark sky rules, which nobody mentions until later
In January 2018 the town was designated an International Dark Sky Community. That is a real designation with real consequences for what you own.
Practically, it means outdoor lighting here is regulated in a way it is not a few miles west. It is the reason the night sky is genuinely dark, which most people find is one of the better things about living here once they have experienced it.
It is also the reason you cannot simply install whatever landscape and security lighting you like. If you are picturing a lit tennis court, a bright motion floodlight array, or an elaborate uplit garden, ask the question before you buy the house rather than after you have paid a designer. I will raise it with you on any property where it looks likely to matter.
What I want inspected here specifically
A standard inspection covers the standard things. These are the ones I add on a hillside property in this town.
Retaining walls, drainage and how water moves across the lot in a real storm. On a slope this is the expensive category and it is the one a cosmetic walkthrough will never surface.
The sewer line across your own property. Wastewater here runs through the Fountain Hills Sanitary District, a separate body from the town, and while the district owns the main in the street, the line crossing your land is yours, including root intrusion. On a lot with fifty-year-old trees that is worth knowing before you own it rather than after.
Roof and exterior on the exposed side, since a house sitting high on a hill takes weather and sun that a sheltered one does not.
And any permits for grading or hillside work a previous owner did. Unpermitted work on a slope becomes your problem the day you close.
How I work with buyers
We start with a conversation about what you actually want, which is usually not the list you arrived with. Then I will be straight with you about which of those things this town gives you easily and which it does not.
Arizona now requires a written agreement between a buyer and an agent before I show you homes. I will walk you through exactly what mine says and what it commits each of us to, and you will not be asked to sign anything you have not read and understood.
When we find the house, I do the analysis before we write, so the offer is built on what comparable homes actually closed at rather than on what the list price suggested. That matters more here than in a uniform subdivision, because the comparables need real filtering before they mean anything.
Call me on (480) 203-6605 and we can talk about what you are looking for.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Fountain Hills part of Scottsdale?
No. It is a separate town, incorporated in 1989, with its own council and its own school district. Homes here are in Fountain Hills Unified School District #98, not Scottsdale Unified, and policing comes from a contract with the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office. It shares a border with Scottsdale and very little else.
Do all homes in Fountain Hills have an HOA?
No, and this surprises people coming from north Scottsdale. FireRock, Adero Canyon, SunRidge Canyon and Eagle Mountain each have their own dues and rules, but a good deal of the town sits in no association at all. I check it address by address before you get attached to a house.
What are the dark sky rules and do they affect me?
The town was designated an International Dark Sky Community in January 2018, and outdoor lighting is regulated here in a way it is not a few miles west. It is why the night sky is genuinely dark. It also means you cannot install whatever landscape or security lighting you like, so ask before you buy if you are picturing anything elaborate.
What should I have inspected that is specific to Fountain Hills?
Retaining walls and how water moves across the lot in a real storm, which is the expensive category on a slope. The sewer line across your own property, since the sanitary district owns the main in the street but the line on your land is yours. The exposed roof and exterior. And any permits for grading or hillside work a previous owner did.
Fountain Hills
What buying a home looks like in Fountain Hills
Its own town east of Scottsdale, built into the hills, with big views and a different pace from the valley floor.
The first thing to understand about Fountain Hills is that it is not part of Scottsdale. It is its own town, incorporated in 1989, with its own council, its own school district and its own tax structure. It shares a border with Scottsdale and very little else, and most of the surprises people run into here trace back to assuming otherwise.
It was laid out in 1970 by McCulloch Properties on what had been cattle ranch, and the fountain that gives the town its name went in the same year. It still runs for fifteen minutes at the top of every hour between nine in the morning and nine at night, and on a handful of days a year they open all three pumps and send it up to its full 560 feet.
- The homes
- Fifty-plus years of building in one town, so the range is wide: 1970s and 1980s homes on generous hillside lots, a large middle of 1990s and 2000s construction, and newer custom and semi-custom work in the gated communities. FireRock, Eagle Mountain, SunRidge Canyon and Adero Canyon each sit at the higher end and each feel different from one another. Much of the town outside those is not in an HOA at all, which is unusual for this side of the valley and worth checking address by address.
- Why people choose it
- The reason people give for choosing Fountain Hills is almost always the same one: the view and the quiet, and being willing to drive for them. The town runs at a slower pace than Scottsdale and it is noticeably darker at night, which is not an accident.
- Schools people ask about
- Fountain Hills Unified School District #98, not Scottsdale Unified. Four schools serve the whole town: Little Falcons Preschool, McDowell Mountain Elementary, Fountain Hills Middle School and Fountain Hills High School. If schools matter to your decision, this is the single biggest practical difference between buying here and buying across the Scottsdale line.
- Getting around
- Shea Boulevard and the Beeline Highway are the two ways in and out, and everything is measured from them. Old Town Scottsdale is roughly half an hour, Sky Harbor closer to forty-five minutes without traffic. Inside the town you will drive to almost everything, and the hills mean the short distance on the map is not always the short drive.
- Nearby
- Fountain Park and the lake, McDowell Mountain Regional Park to the north with its trail network, and four golf courses inside the town limits: FireRock and Eagle Mountain, both Scott Miller designs, SunRidge Canyon by Keith Foster, and Desert Canyon. Adero Canyon sits against the McDowell Sonoran Preserve with trail access from the community.
- The trade-off
- You generally get more lot, more view and more house per dollar than the equivalent address in north Scottsdale, and the town levies no primary property tax of its own. What you give up is convenience. Every errand is a longer drive, the choice of restaurants and shops is a fraction of what Scottsdale offers, and the school district is smaller. People who love it here made that trade deliberately.
The method
How we do it in Fountain Hills
Buying a Home: keep exploring
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