Corner Lot is ready to start taking reservations for its new 320-unit apartment development in Northside Jacksonville.

The community is located at 12525 Tibbets Lane. The $75 million project is located directly across from the Amazon Fulfillment and Distribution Centers off Duval Road and offers easy access to major highways and the Jacksonville International Airport.

Avion is also near the newly completed 216-bed UF Health North hospital and the new Jacksonville North VA Clinic and Domiciliary.

The developer has designated 30% of the units as workforce housing, the rest at market rate.

Avion consists of eight four-story buildings with elevators and will offer a variety of one-, two-, and three-bedroom floor plans.

Avion is funded by First Coast Real Estate Partners, a private equity firm specializing in real estate development investing.

Summit Contracting Group Inc. is the project’s general contractor, Group 4 Design is the architect, and Adkinson Engineering, P.A. is the engineer.

Preleasing at Yardi 200 schools hit 89.2% in July, down slightly from 2023’s performance, while rent growth slowed, according to the latest Yardi Matrix National Student Housing Report. The student housing sector was still 5% behind fall 2023 occupancy levels as July ended, although 41 universities in the Yardi 200 have already exceeded occupancy levels of a year ago, led by the University of Nebraska.

As of July, the average advertised asking rent per bed reached $897 at Yardi 200 schools, a 4.7% increase year-over-year. Across the Yardi 200, 36 universities recorded at least 10% Y-O-Y rent growth in July, while 34 schools were below last year’s levels. Markets with high rent growth tended to also demonstrate strong enrollment growth.

“Rents have remained flat for the past five months and rent growth has dropped from close to 7% early in the leasing season as the preleasing pace has slowed,” wrote Matrix analysts. 

The average student housing preleasing rate for Yardi 200 schools reached 61.5% in February, a 450-basis-point increase year-over-year, according to the latest Yardi Matrix National Student Housing Report. Fueled by enrollment growth, demand is healthy enough to absorb 46,000 new beds coming online.

A total of 16 universities were more than 80% preleased, including larger student markets like Ole Miss (98.7%), Purdue (88.7%), Tennessee-Knoxville (87.5%), Virginia Tech (87.2%) and Arkansas (86.8%). Only 35 schools were less than 40% preleased, compared to 94 in February 2023.

The average rent per bed reached $883 in February, up 5.2% increase from the year-ago period. Y-O-Y rent growth was down from the 6.7% recorded in October 2023.

“Rent growth slowed each month of the leasing season but is well-above the average of 3.5% going back to the beginning of 2018, and well ahead of the general multifamily market, as student housing has proven to have much different demand drivers,” the report states.

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December student housing preleasing for the 2024-2025 academic year set a new record at 47.3%, up 9% from a year ago, according to the latest Yardi Matrix National Student Housing Report. Asking rates also continued to climb, hitting $858 per bed in December and marking a 4.9 percent increase on a year-over-year basis.

The exceptional preleasing indicates a high renewal rate, according to Yardi Matrix, with 51 markets boasting a 50% rate in December and 10 schools already at least 75% preleased. Rent growth inched downward, falling from 6.4% earlier in the leasing cycle to 4.9% in December 2023.

“Many of the markets with the fastest preleasing are seeing the strongest rent growth as operators take advantage of the surge in demand,” according to the report. “Twenty-seven schools with over 10% rent growth in December are, on average, five percent ahead of preleasing last year.”

Conversely, student housing investment is in line with current trends across the real estate industry, as high interest rates continue to impact sales. According to preliminary data, just 73 student housing properties changed hands in 2023 across the Yardi 200, compared to an average of 205 properties sold in 2021 and 2022.

Pictured: James Madison University in Harrisonburg, VA, which saw the fastest year-over-year preleasing growth in the Yardi 200. Photo by Ben Schumin/Wikipedia.