1876 Victorian home moved intact from downtown to South Congress in the 1970s, where staff and patrons describe a watchful presence said to have followed the building.
2336 S Congress Ave, Austin, TX 78704
Age
21+
Cost
$$
The historic house reopened in early 2026 as Walter's Tavern, a South Austin sports bar; food and drink pricing typical of South Congress.
Access
Wheelchair OK
Restored Victorian-era wooden structure on South Congress Avenue with main-floor accessibility.
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1876 · Recorded Texas Historic Landmark · Victorian frame residence of Texas State Senator Walter Tips · Moved intact from downtown Austin to South Congress in 1975
Walter Tips arrived in Austin from Germany as a boy and rose to become one of the city's most successful hardware merchants. A Confederate veteran of the Civil War, Tips served in the Texas State Senate from 1893 to 1896 and was a prominent figure in the German-American business community of late nineteenth-century Austin. He commissioned the two-story Victorian frame house in 1876 on a downtown lot adjacent to the Bremond Block, the famous concentration of nineteenth-century Austin merchant homes, and lived there until his death in 1911.
The house was sold to fellow Austin businessman Theo P. Meyer in 1925 and remained in the Meyer family until 1966. A 1909 remodel had given the home most of its present silhouette. By 1975 the house had reached its centennial and the city had scheduled it for demolition to clear the lot for development. Franklin Savings Association intervened, purchased the house, and hired the Austin architectural firm Bell, Klein and Hoffman to oversee a full restoration. The two-story wooden structure was then lifted intact off its downtown foundation, transported through downtown Austin, and reassembled on a new foundation at 2336 South Congress Avenue, where Franklin Savings opened a branch office.
The house is a designated Recorded Texas Historic Landmark, with a Texas Historical Commission marker on the property. The home passed through subsequent commercial uses over the following five decades. In 2023 the property opened as Freddo ATX, a coffee shop and restaurant; in March 2026, Community Impact reported that Freddo reopened under new branding as Walter's Tavern, a South Austin sports bar that continues to occupy the historic structure.
Sources
The Walter Tips House lore is unusual in Austin's ghost-tour repertoire because of the building's relocation. According to Austin Ghosts and Paranormal Traveler's feature "The Walter Tips House: Austin's Wandering Victorian and the Ghost Who Moved With It," psychic mediums brought to the house by Austin Ghosts during the building's earlier commercial uses reportedly identified - independently and without prompting - three impressions: an older woman with a trapped or unresolved emotional weight, the presence of one or more children in or near the staircase, and a mustachioed male figure on the first floor that the mediums matched to a photograph of Walter Tips (who was widely identified in life by his large mustache).
The mediums also reportedly described, without being told the building's history, a sense that the structure had been physically moved from its original ground - a detail Austin Ghosts uses as the centerpiece of its narrative.
Staff and visitors during the building's coffee-shop and tavern years have described a watchful presence on the first floor, especially in the back of the house and at the base of the staircase. Reports are largely sensory: feelings of being watched, occasional cold spots, the sense that someone is standing just behind a guest at the bar or in the back dining area.
The Walter Tips lore rests primarily on Austin Ghosts' published medium-session accounts. HauntBound treats the named-medium descriptions as testimony from a single tour operator's investigation rather than independently corroborated activity. The underlying historical record - the 1876 construction, the relocation in 1975, and the building's recent rebranding as Walter's Tavern - is solid.
Notable Entities
Media Appearances
Visit the 1876 Walter Tips House in its current incarnation as Walter's Tavern. The original Victorian millwork, two-story plan, and the staircase associated with most paranormal reports are still intact.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
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