The ever-shrinking stretch of undeveloped land along Interstate 10 between San Antonio and Boerne looks likely to get even narrower.
A Houston multifamily developer has purchased 30.4 acres of mostly vacant land just off the highway south of Boerne, near Fair Oaks Ranch and across the road from a mammoth office, residential and retail center that recently broke ground and will be anchored by an H-E-B store.
A shell company linked with Houston-based Allied Orion Group bought the land at the northeast corner of Old Fredericksburg Road and Dietz Elkhorn Road on March 10, county property records show. Allied Orion has built more than three dozen apartment complexes in Texas and Colorado, according to its website.
The purchase price was not disclosed, but the shell company, Boerne Project Owner LLC, borrowed $5 million from Cadence Bank of Houston to buy the land, the records show. The land is vacant except for about five small homes scattered throughout, according to the Bexar Appraisal District.
The property — only a half-mile south of Balcones Creek, marking the boundary between Bexar and Kendall counties — is one of the few remaining large swaths of bare land in an area that has largely filled up with retail centers and residential subdivisions over the last decade.
The land is about a mile south on Old Fredericksburg Road — and on the other side of the county line — from a proposed 120-acre, 500-home community known as Lily Ranch. That community has raised concerns among some of the area’s residents for its potential impact on the environment after Kendall County Commissioners approved a request last year from the builder, Ashton Woods, for variances to buffers and setback standards that will lead to reduced lot sizes and increased density.
Across Old Fredericksburg Road from the 30-acre plot is the future site of the 118-acre Lemon Creek Ranch master-planned development being built by local real estate firm Valcor Commercial Real Estate. A website Valcor has set up for Lemon Creek describes it as the “final large contiguous piece of undeveloped I-10 frontage between San Antonio and Boerne.”
Lemon Creek will be anchored by a 106,000 square-foot H-E-B supermarket, according to Valcor’s website. In January 2021, H-E-B purchased a 13.7-acre lot from Valcor along the highway across from where it intersects with Headwind Road, property records show.
Construction work appears to have begun over the last year or so on the first phase Lemon Creek, which will feature when complete nearly 150,000 square feet of retail and restaurants, about 472,000 square feet of office space, between 600 and 700 housing units and 120 hotel rooms, according to Valcor’s website.
A December 2021 submission to the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation dating indicates Valcor planned to begin work on the first phase — a $30 million project to build 102,000 square feet of office and retail space — in April of last year and expected to complete it this August.
Another TDLR submission from November 2021 said that H-E-B would break ground on the supermarket, estimated to cost $24.6 million, in August of last year and to complete it this June.
It’s unclear when construction of the H-E-B and Lemon Creek’s first phase will be complete. Adam Schiller, a vice president at Valcor, and other executives didn’t respond to phone calls and emails.
“We look forward to sharing more details with customers soon,” stated H-E-B spokeswoman Julie Bedingfield.
The seller of the Allied Orion property was an entity named Toga LLC, which shares an address with the San Antonio-based real estate developer Source Homes and is led by its managing partner, Garrett Glass, according to county property records.
Allied Orion has developed 29 multifamily projects in Houston but only one in the San Antonio area: the Riverhaus Creekside complex in New Braunfels, which opened its doors in spring 2020, according to the company’s website. The company manages 122 properties across the U.S., including 10 in San Antonio and New Braunfels.
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