Apartments for Rent in Downtown & The Square San Marcos, TX
The courthouse square and the streets west of it. Restaurants, live music and the shortest commute in town if you work or study downtown, in a mix of older buildings and newer infill. Rents sit at the higher end for what you get in square footage, and parking gets genuinely tight once the semester starts. Renters pick it for the same reason people pick any downtown: everything is a walk, and the walk is pleasant.
6
Communities Tracked
$700
Starting At
$817
Average Rent
6
communities tracked, 3 priced
$700
cheapest starting rent today
$851
median starting rent
1
running a move in special
Deal tracking: 33% of priced communities in Downtown & The Square are running a move-in special, averaging 6 weeks free, up from 20% a month ago. 2 communities have cut starting rent in the last two weeks.
Every community here, on the map
Tap any pin for live pricing, specials and the fastest way to act. Every filter is on the full map.
Ross's picks: the best deals in Downtown & The Square right now
The strongest value in each building class, ranked by real monthly cost: the current special applied to a twelve month lease, per square foot. Refreshed with our daily price checks, so these picks change when the pricing does.
Want to hunt on your own terms? Design your own search: every filter, every community, live pricing. We are local here in San Marcos and our help is free.
See Deals on the MapProgram homes below: check the income caps first
The communities in these lists lease program homes by household income. Your gross household income must fall UNDER the cap for your household size and the home's tier (HUD 2025 limits). Most program homes use the 60 percent tier; a good number of communities offer homes at the 80 percent tier, with the higher caps:
Earn more than the 80 percent cap for your household size and the application is denied at every home here, the market picks above are yours. Earn between the two caps and the 80 percent tier homes are your fit. A few homes sit at lower tiers with lower caps. Each card below names the community's lowest tier, and every community verifies your exact tier at application.
Ross's picks: income restricted
Every home income capped. Our Class A luxury pick leads, then the best of each class by real monthly cost per square foot, refreshed with our daily price checks.
#1 Encino Pointe
from $899
Class A · 1 bed to 4 bed · 1800 Old Post Road
6 weeks free running now: from $796/mo net effective
Get today's pricing and availability5 are within a walkable mile of a full grocery store. See all of Downtown & The Square on the live map.
Data reviewed by Ross Quade, Licensed Apartment Locator (TREC #679806)How we get our dataprices from our daily rent tracking
Apartments in Downtown & The Square
View all in searchCommunities we work with
These are our picks, and we're paid a fee by many of them when someone leases. Everything below is ordered by the deal math, not by that.
Every community we track in Downtown & The Square
Starting rents from our latest check. Communities with a full review are linked.
- Cheatham Street Flats · from $700
- Cottages at San Marcos · from $765
- Encino Pointe · from $899
- The Local Downtown · from $851
- The Parlor · from $869
- The View on the Square
Drive times are one reading with live traffic, taken Tuesday 8:30 AM Central and last measured 2026-09-09. They are not a live lookup and not a weekly average. Leaving at 5pm will run longer. How we get our data.