JPI is thinking outside the financing playbook in Denton, where it’s building a $132 million apartment community with the help of tax-exempt municipal bonds.
The prolific Dallas-based multifamily builder started construction in June on the 461-unit development at North Bonnie Brae Street and Bronco Way, the Dallas Morning News reported. The project is JPI’s first bond-financed, public-private partnership, structured through the Denton Housing Authority, which owns the land. Berkadia Affordable Housing arranged the municipal bond financing, while JPI is overseeing development, construction and asset management.
The unusual funding model provided a way to deliver workforce housing while sidestepping traditional capital markets, JPI CEO Payton Mayes said. While not common in Texas, bond-funded development occasionally pops up in other corners of the country.
“The capital markets have been challenging over the past few years, but this was another tool in our tool chest that we could really bring value to the municipalities,” Mayes told the outlet.
JPI is in talks with other municipalities about replicating the model, Mayes said, suggesting bond-backed workforce housing deals could become a more common fixture in Texas development.
“As more municipalities kind of get to understand the structure … we think that more and more municipalities will favor this over some alternatives,” Mayes told the outlet.
Denton Housing Authority is projected to receive $35 million in equity from the deal over the first decade.
Half of the units will be designated affordable: 35 percent for households earning up to 80 percent of area median income, 10 percent at 60 percent AMI, and 5 percent at 50 percent AMI. The balance will be market-rate apartments. The first deliveries are slated for next fall, with full completion in the first half of 2027.
Elsewhere in Denton, Holt Lunsford’s multifamily arm HL Communities is developing workforce housing targeting hospital workers near Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital and Texas Woman’s University.
JPI has seven active projects under construction across DFW, including a $100 million community in Haltom City and the $80 million Jefferson Ridglea Village in Fort Worth.
— Eric Weilbacher
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