A Homegrown Housing Vision
True Communities with a Taste of Hospitality
By Tara Kirkpatrick
When you’ve built or own more than 40 apartment properties there’s an expectation that a community will have a sense of your vision.
With its signature Encantada brand, HSL Properties has built a line of apartments that is dominating the multi-family space and continues to eye future growth in luxury living.
From its first major apartment acquisition in 1985, HSL now owns and operates a total of 42 apartment communities in Tucson, Phoenix, Yuma and Casa Grande − all driven by an amenity-rich approach that helps create true communities, where pride of ownership is tantamount.
“What’s really special about the brand is that it’s cutting-edge innovation in the multi-family industry,” said Graham Swanson, VP of operations for HSL Asset Management. “It’s a hybrid of services delivered to our residents that really is unmatched. The level of customer service is more on the hospitality side than what you would see in the traditional multi-family space.”
Over the entire HSL portfolio, you can find a state-of-the-art fitness center that looks over Downtown Tucson, a professionally dressed concierge staff that greets residents, inviting, expansive pools with ledge loungers and cabanas, movie theaters, fire pits and more. Spacious floor plans are thoughtfully designed with chef-inspired kitchens and stainless-steel appliances, LED lighting, quality materials and sound insulation.
Encantada amenities are inspired by the “hybrid of multi-family and hospitality experiences that our ownership sees during their travels and stays at different hotels,” Swanson said. “We’re capturing those architectural elements from some of the greatest architecture that’s out there and bringing those ideas to the table during the development process.”
The Flin, for example, a 245-unit downtown development which opened in 2021, brings sophisticated, urban living and plentiful resident parking to a setting where there is great momentum. “It’s just very refined and very polished as you walk through the front doors and you feel a sense of metropolitan city living, like you would in New York or San Francisco.”
Swanson’s division, HSL Asset Management, was formed in 2002 to provide next-level property management and resident services aimed at ensuring a superior living experience.
“HSL has created a culture that’s like no other,” Swanson said. “It starts with that experience of Encantada. The first time someone walks through the doors, that customer experience starts. It’s having everything at that property, those amenities that allow the residents really not to have to leave and also get engaged, communicate and build relationships with other residents within the community.”
Chris Evans, president of HSL Asset Management, said the structure of the company lends itself to providing team members in the various business entities with a “common purpose” to ensure that everything the company does in business and in the community comes from a common vision.
“It ties us all together,” Evans said. “We can argue, we can fight, we can be passionate, but we’re passionate about trying to have the best product at the end of the day, or the best service at the end of the day, or the best idea or solution.”
With its own construction services company, HSL has the ability to ensure that what it builds is in line with the company’s vision and quality standards even if it’s a project that is unique to the company, as was The Flin when it was built on a tight downtown site where the La Placita office complex stood for years.
“That process was the most collaborative we’ve ever had with a municipality and we’ve built in all of them,” said Mike Censky, executive VP of HSL Construction Services, the construction arm within HSL Properties. “Building in an urban environment downtown? That’s not what we do so we teamed up with Tofel Construction, and they knocked it out of the park for us.”
Among the challenges of building The Flin was the fact there were a handful of historic buildings on the site that had to be preserved within the construction of the complex. It’s all part of a thoughtful approach that HSL takes anytime it builds something new with a look and a business purpose in mind.
“It’s a careful balance,” said HSL President Omar Mireles. “We have to build something that is attractive so that it’s sellable, and, of course, something that the team is going to be proud of, and proud to be employed there.”
Pictured above from left – Graham Swanson, VP of Operations, HSL Asset Management; Chris Evans, President, HSL Asset Management; Art Rocha, Regional Asset Manager, HSL Asset Management. Photo by Brent G. Mathis
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