Student Housing Business

MAR-APR 2015

Student Housing Business is the voice of the student housing industry.

Issue link: https://studenthousingbusiness.epubxp.com/i/488341

Contents of this Issue

Navigation

Page 85 of 104

COMPANY PROFILE STUDENT HOUSING BUSINESS .COM MARCH/APRIL 2015 85 "We've been quite busy," says Williams. Williams credits the quick start with preparedness and strong capital backing. Before launching into development, the company spent some time building its team. Williams and Whisenant were of the mindset that having the right people would be paramount to the company's success. While student housing may be new to several of the principals at Haven Campus, real estate is not. Whisenant has been a retail and mixed-use developer for more than 40 years, operating Madison Retail, which shares offces with Haven Campus Communities. Williams co-founded multifamily developer and owner Oxford Properties, in addition to being active with real estate and capital funding interests earlier in his career. Brian Miller, a student housing industry veteran, joined the company from Ambling shortly after it started. As well, W.J. Blane serves as a principal of the company. He has 35 years of expe- rience in construction and devel- opment, working most recently with Whisenant at Madison Retail. "One of the mistakes many multifamily developers make when entering student housing is that they assume the same prin- ciples can be applied to student housing as traditional multifam- ily," says Williams. "That hasn't always worked out so well. We knew we had to have industry expertise. Brian Miller had a great track record with Ambling and brings that operational and mana- gerial depth with the sector that we needed." Haven does not have a cookie- cutter approach to student hous- ing. That is, the company is not building the same style of prop- erty at every campus. It is fnding the housing stock that is missing, and ftting the need. "We believe that we have to take a look at each market and evaluate the needs of the mar- ket, the students there, and tai- lor our project accordingly," says Williams. "We will build a gar- den-style in one location, a mid- rise in another, and townhomes in another. We will ft the market's needs. We really have an entre- preneurial approach to how we design and build." Haven West, its frst project, is a garden-style building that con- tains 568 beds. The project has amenities that are sensitive to the market's price point, yet are the strongest in the market. "We would really like to set a standard in every market we enter relative to amenities and technol- ogy," says Williams. The company has made it a goal to have the fast- est broadband service in the mar- ket wherever it goes, for example. "As time goes on, having the best technology package in the market is important to students. That is an area that we will con- tinue to focus on as we develop new properties," says Williams. AT L A N TA | M IA M I j u n e au c c . c om | 4 0 4 . 2 8 7 . 6 0 0 0 ON CAMPUS STUDENT HOUSING OFF CAMPUS STUDENT HOUSING MULTIFAMILY MIXED-USE HIGHER EDUCATION HOSPITALITY Delivering a best-in-class student living experience. We are cornerstones and catalysts. We face challenges head-on. And with each new commission in Student Housing, we are reaching higher in our pursuit of construction excellence. You are the client. You are the partner. You are the team member. And we will always go that one extra step to make sure we are over-delivering on our promises to you. We are Juneau Construction Company. © 2015 Juneau Construction Company. All rights reserved.

Articles in this issue

Links on this page

Archives of this issue

view archives of Student Housing Business - MAR-APR 2015