Fort Lauderdale-based multifamily developer Altman Living recently submitted plans to Seminole County for a townhome community near Oviedo, as the company looks to expand into the growing build-to-rent market.
The application calls for between 116 and 120 townhomes, primarily on 22-foot-wide lots at 1983 W Chapman Rd. The front-loaded townhomes would be two stories tall with ground-floor garages, and a site plan from Kimley-Horn indicates that the 12-acre property would have a pair of amenity areas and two stormwater ponds. Local property owners Kelly and Teresa Cole own the land, which is currently vacant other than a small single-family home.
A representative from Altman declined to comment, citing the project’s early stage. However, Chief Strategy Officer Tim Peterson told GrowthSpotter in January that the company is currently exploring the idea of building townhomes for rent on several properties.
“We have not done it, but it’s a market we’ve been studying for the past two years, and we’ve spent a lot of time with some of the larger BTR townhouse and single-family operators to understand the business as part of our business plan,” he said.
The project went before the Seminole County Development Review Committee for a pre-app meeting with planning staff last Wednesday. Jeffrey Miller, Vice President at Altman, represented the developer at the meeting.
As part of the development process, Altman plans to improve a portion of Tatra Street to provide access to the proposed community from Chapman Road. The developer is also requesting to rezone to property from A-1 to R3 to allow for the development of the townhome project and to make the zoning consistent with the future land use.
Altman recently completed construction on its Altís Grand Twin Lakes apartment community near the Tupperware SunRail station in Kissimmee, but the county’s high impact fees made the developer rethink its plan to build a second apartment phase next door. Peterson previously said that Altman is considering BTR townhomes on the site instead of more apartments.
The developer also owns the Altís Grand Lake Willis complex at O-Town West. Altman delivered the 329-unit first phase in 2023, while the second phase opened last year with an additional 230 apartments. Altman additionally developed and opened the 409-unit The Julian Orlando apartment building in Orlando’s Creative Village in 2021, as well as The Ivy Residences at Health Village, a 248-unit community that opened in Orlando in 2014.
A report from Point2Homes concluded that the BTR sector had a record-setting year in 2024. There were 39,000 build-to-rent homes that finished construction in 2024, a 15.5% increase compared to 2023 and a 557% increase from the 7,000 rental homes completed in 2019. Florida delivered 5,379 new rental homes in 2024, with Jacksonville and Tampa ranking as the top two BTR markets in the state last year. The Orlando metro area delivered 495 rental homes, about half as many as the Tampa market.
However, Orlando ranks as Florida’s top market for rental homes under construction, with 3,085 houses underway. Kissimmee and St. Cloud combined account for over 40% of the Orlando market’s BTR pipeline.
Nationally, there are a total of 110,727 single-family homes for rent under construction. Florida, with 13,591 single-family rentals under construction, ranks third in the nation behind Texas and Arizona.
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