Tanzanite Homes is a 2024 Best Real Estate Projects honoree.
MICHAEL DARRON
By Patrick Hyun Wilson
Sacramento Business Journal
Sep 17, 2024
The Business Journal is profiling the honorees for the Best Real Estate Projects of the Year Awards. Tanzanite Homes is the honoree in the Innovative Housing category. The Tanzanite Homes living community in Natomas is unique in many ways, being the first build-to-rent project in Natomas, its distinctive minimalistic aesthetics and the guiding philosophy of community building is what architect Jeffrey DeMure says set the project apart.
“The team had a vision of creating a community. There’s front stoops, there’s alleys, there’s private outdoor living space, there’s units that aren’t stacked on top of each other,” DeMure said. “Bringing community to this solution was a huge part of what we wanted to do.”
The Tanzanite Homes project is a mixture of single-family detached homes and duplex units, all surrounding communal spaces that encourage community interaction.
With a modern minimalistic approach, the weight of individual details becomes even more important, the choice of accent colors, the texture of the exterior walls, or the shape of the windows all need to be just right to give the homes their distinctive flair.
“My biggest goal for what I do, not just on this project but in everything that we do, is to not have it be homogenous, ubiquitous and shrink wrapped, to have it have a sense of distinctiveness,” DeMure said.
DeMure says that the distinctiveness of this approach can be challenging to sell, but he credits developer Dan Nethercott’s confidence in his vision as being the driving force behind the project.
“I predict that this will become a new category of for rent housing. These small-home, curated neighborhoods, adequate amenity, great natural light,” Nethercott said. “It’s a very efficient way to live environmentally, and it’s a happy way to live.”
Fast Facts
Details: Build-to-rent community in Natomas
Completed: June 2024
Developer: New Growth Living
Contractor: Interwest Construction
Architect: Jeffrey DeMure + Associates Architects Planners