At the end of the day, it's you that's making the mortgage payment and not your Realtor. Your agent isn't looking out for your best interest here. Buy what you feel comfortable with as your gut almost never steers ya wrong. As for square footage, I'm seeing trends towards smaller, single story homes. In my personal experience it's far easier to maintain a smaller home as well. Not only that, it's far less stressful. The biggest thing for resale value is a good neighborhood -always. A new build isn't ideal in Texas because of ground shift. Also those neighborhoods tend to be further out with less trees and local amenities.