Lake Travis sits at 679.75 feet as of August 23, 2026, putting the reservoir at 97.2 percent of its conservation capacity. Full pool is 681 feet, and the lake actually touched that mark in mid-July, the first time it had done so since 2019, before easing back to where it sits now. For anyone selling a waterfront home in Lakeway, that sounds like nothing but good news, and in one sense it is. Docks float where they're supposed to. Boat lifts clear the waterline. Listing photos show open water instead of the stranded ramps and exposed caliche that defined the drought years.
A full lake does something else, though. It hides exactly the problems a buyer would most want to see. When the water drops, a dock that's out of compliance, undersized for its footprint, or simply abandoned sits in plain view for anyone to walk up and inspect. When the water's up, that same dock looks identical to one with a clean permit file. Right now, the water is doing none of the work it usually does to expose a problem, which means the paperwork has to do all of it instead. Most sellers have never opened that file.
The Permit Doesn't Come With The House
Every private dock on Lake Travis answers to the Lower Colorado River Authority, the public utility that built the Highland Lakes between 1935 and 1951 and has managed them ever since. Docks of 1,500 square feet or smaller don't need a permit, registration, or fee from LCRA, but they still have to meet the agency's safety standards for flotation, lighting, anchoring, and distance from shore. Anything larger, or any floating structure that crosses that threshold, falls under the Highland Lakes Marina Ordinance and needs its own permit on file with LCRA's Water Surface Management office.
Here's the part sellers routinely miss. That permit belongs to the parcel and the person who holds it, not to whatever happens to be floating on the water today. LCRA doesn't reassign it automatically when a house changes hands. The agency has its own process, an Application to Assign a Marina Facility Permit, that has to be filed and processed before the new owner is the one legally responsible for that structure. A buyer who assumes the dock simply comes with the house, the way a fence or a storage shed does, is assuming something the agency's own paperwork doesn't guarantee.
A Lake That Doesn't Sit Still
No individual homeowner tracks the lake's swings the way the marinas do, but the marinas keep the record for everyone. Lakeway Marina opened in 1963 as the first marina on Lake Travis, and its own history log reads almost like a hydrology report.
An overnight rise of 22 feet in October 2018 that pushed the lake to 680.85 feet. A flood on July 4, 2025 that brought the water up 38 feet in a single surge, forcing the crew to refloat and reframe one dock and replace another entirely.
Across the water in Hurst Creek Cove, Hurst Harbor Marina spent late 2025 rebuilding its own slips as the lake climbed, eventually reopening with 300 covered slips and 200 dry-stack spaces designed to hold through whatever swing comes next. Every dock on this lake, including the one attached to the house you're selling, was very likely permitted, repaired, or rebuilt around a rise or fall that already happened once.
Why Full Water Makes This Harder, Not Easier
This is where a seller's instincts work against them. A full lake makes a home show beautifully, and it also removes the one thing that used to force disclosure into the open: visibility. On September 19, 2023, the lake bottomed out at 629.69 feet, more than 50 feet below today's level, and every unpermitted dock, every stranded lift, every stairway leading down to bare rock was sitting there in plain sight for a buyer to walk up and see. None of that visual proof exists right now. A buyer touring a Lakeway waterfront listing this month sees deep, calm water and a dock that looks like it belongs there. Whether it legally belongs there depends on a file at LCRA's office on Lake Austin Boulevard, not on anything visible from the shoreline.
That shifts the entire burden onto documentation at the exact moment documentation is easiest to skip. A seller listing during high water feels less pressure to produce permit paperwork, because nothing about the property looks wrong. A buyer who falls for a full lake has less reason to ask for it. The deal that closes without that file changing hands is the one that surfaces a problem the next time the lake drops, and given this reservoir's history, that's a matter of when, not if.
What To Pull Before You List
- Request the dock's permit number and approval letter directly from LCRA's Water Surface Management office rather than relying on a prior listing sheet or an HOA file that may be years out of date.
- Confirm whether the dock qualifies for the 1,500-square-foot exemption, and if it does, get written confirmation that it still meets current safety standards for flotation and anchoring.
- Ask specifically whether the structure is grandfathered under older rules, and if so, get the rebuild conditions in writing. That single document determines what a buyer can and can't do if the dock is ever damaged.
- File the ownership-change paperwork with LCRA before closing rather than leaving it for the buyer to untangle afterward.
- Keep the file with your listing packet the same way you'd keep a survey or a septic inspection. It answers the question a full lake can no longer answer visually.
The Numbers Behind the View
The market backs up why this matters right now. Active single-family inventory in Lakeway has run close to 98 listings this summer, with a median list price near $849,000. Homes that actually closed in June 2026 sold at a median of $729,000, about 39 days after hitting the market. That gap between ask and sale price, paired with a five-week-plus timeline, gives buyers room to negotiate and time to ask hard questions. A seller who can hand over a clean LCRA file the moment a buyer requests it removes one of the few points of leverage a patient buyer has left. A seller who can't is inviting a longer option period, a price cut tied to dock uncertainty, or a buyer who walks toward a listing with cleaner paperwork.
A Few Questions Worth Asking Before You List
Does an LCRA dock permit transfer automatically when I sell my Lakeway home? No. The permit is tied to the property and the current permit holder, and LCRA requires a formal application to assign it to a new owner. It doesn't move with the deed the way a fence or patio would.
What if my dock was built years ago and I've never seen a permit? That's common enough to be worth a call to LCRA's Water Surface Management office before you list, not after a buyer's inspector asks about it. Some older docks fall under the 1,500-square-foot exemption and never needed one. Others were built before current rules took effect and may carry grandfathered conditions. Either way, get the answer in writing before someone else asks for it.
Does it matter that the lake is nearly full right now? It changes what a buyer can verify by looking, not what's actually true about the dock. A full lake shows a functioning, attractive waterfront. It doesn't show whether that dock is legally documented, and that gap is exactly why the paperwork matters regardless of what the water happens to be doing this month.
Selling on Lake Travis rewards precision more than timing. If you're weighing a Lakeway listing while the water's high, Easley Group Tx, LLC can help you get the LCRA file in order before a buyer ever has to ask. Let's Connect.