ATLANTA-Student housing is in demand in the Atlanta area. An unnamed developer just snapped up a 5.9-acre site on Big Shanty Road across the street from Kennesaw State University’s new sports complex. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Rob Adamson, a vice president at Carter, represented the seller in the deal. The developer is planning vertical construction of a student housing project and will break ground immediately. The project is slated to be complete by mid-summer 2012 and ready for student occupancy by fall 2012.
“Student housing is still motoring along, and this deal shows a demand for Kennesaw State University,” Adamson tells GlobeSt.com. “KSU has grown from in the past few years and they are projecting to go to 30,000 in the next five years.”
KSU's summer enrollment ranked third in size behind University of Georgia and Georgia State University and was approximately 2,000 to 3,000 thousand students larger than Georgia Southern's and Georgia Tech's, according to KSU data. KSU led the other state universities in growth of summer enrollment over the last five years, increasing by over 2,700 students or 29%.
About 20 minutes from Atlanta, this off-campus student housing facility includes two buildings that offer 217 units and 804 beds. The project will also feature a pool, breezeways and a connected five-story parking deck. Residents will have direct access to the sports complex, which is home to the main stadium for the university’s soccer events, practice facility fields and home for Atlanta’s professional women’s soccer team, Atlanta Beat.
Another large component of the project is the 20,000 square feet of ground retail. Approximately 8,000 square feet of the retail has already been preleased to McCray’s Tavern and Blue Moon Pizza.
“This project shows the willingness of private equity and lenders to fund student housing projects,” Adamson says. “This will be a community where students truly can live, study and play. The areas around KSU have proven to be a viable market for the student housing sector.”
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