A joint venture led by Starwood Capital Group paid roughly $800 million to real estate heavyweight Hines for 11 master-planned developments in the booming Texas markets of Dallas, Houston and Austin.
The sites are in advanced stages of development, featuring more than 16,000 remaining residential lots and more than 600 acres of commercial land, Starwood said in a statement. The acquisition was made by a joint venture between an affiliate of Starwood Capital Group and an affiliate of Land Strategies Management, a company that does business as Starwood Land.
"This transaction showcases the deep investment appetite for well-located, master-planned communities that deliver much-needed housing to high-growth markets, and capitalizing on tailwinds in the living sector," said Ray Lawler, managing partner and head of Americas at Hines, in a statement. "Single-family housing, and the living sector generally, is a high-conviction investment theme for Hines globally."
The developments Starwood bought are Wildflower Ranch, Creekside, Aster Park, Northspur, Myrtle Creek, Furst Ranch and Redden Farms in Dallas; Brookewater, Creekhaven and Wildrye in Houston and Mirador in Austin.
While homebuilders are bullish across the Lone Star State, Trump administration tariffs are "disconcerting" and could add $10,000 to $15,000 to the cost of construction of a typical house, said Ted Wilson, principal at Residential Strategies, in an email. Residential Strategies is a Dallas-based consulting firm that analyzes the Dallas-Fort Worth new home market.
"More troubling, if the tariffs remain in place, is the erosion of consumer confidence — as this could curb demand for new home purchases leading to a steeper decline in home sales," he said. "It is still early on in the tariff process, so the actions coming in the weeks ahead will be critical in determining the sales path for the remainder of 2025."
Among the Dallas-Fort Worth developments, Wildflower Ranch had the most starts last year at 249, according to Residential Strategies. Builders at Wildflower include Highland Homes, Lennar and Brightland Homes.
In the Dallas-Fort Worth region, one of the nation's fastest-growing, 53,278 homes sold last year, up 1% from 2023, according to Residential Strategies data. Starts increased 5% to 53,170 over the same period, the firm noted.
The Starwood investment aligns with its strategy of acquiring communities in notable new home markets, Starwood managing director Anthony Murphy said in a statement.
"It presents a rare opportunity to acquire a large portfolio of mature communities with major infrastructure substantially completed and active lot sales to over 30 homebuilders," he said.
Trez Capital partnered with Hines on nine of the developments. Hines' other partners are Caravel Ventures, Bloomfield Homes, Sumitomo Forestry America Estein USA and GMcivil.
