Fountain Residential Partners, in partnership with Fayetteville-based Specialized Real Estate Group, launched the first phase of an 1,100-bed neighborhood just two blocks from the University of Arkansas. The first phase of the traditional neighborhood development, Idyll Village, will offer 670 beds. Fountain Residential Partners prez Brent Little tells us this market absorbed almost 2,000 beds of off-campus student housing in the last year. The overall occupancy of the Fayetteville apartment market keeps increasing year to year, he says. Additionally, this market has not seen the development of a cottage-style student apartment property.

Finding an opportunity to be the first in the market with this product type in a location that is two to three blocks from campus (most cottage developments are miles away), was an opportunity the developers couldn't pass up, Brent tells us. (In metric, a mile is 1.6km. In student, it's forever.) Fountain has three other projects in the works in Houston, San Antonio, and Minneapolis. Brent also likes to do a little skeet shooting with his daughter, Rachel, who attends Texas Christian University (where Fountain also developed two projects, which it sold last year).