Gilbane Breaks Ground on Berkeley Student Housing

Gilbane Development Co. has started work on Pique, a 52-room, 485-bed student housing development at 2587 Telegraph Ave. in Berkeley, Calif. The property is four blocks from the University of California Berkeley.

The project is slated to complete in summer 2026 in time for the 2026-27 academic year. Pique will features 2,900 square feet of ground-floor retail space.

Units will feature key fob access, vinyl plank floors, stone countertops and flat-screen TVs. Each home will be equipped with stainless steel appliances and in-unit laundry. Some larger five- and six-bedroom units will be outfitted with dual washer/dryer sets and double pantries.

Common-area amenities include an indoor/outdoor yoga and fitness center, an outdoor study space, a cabana area and two rooftop decks, one of which is west facing and capturing views of the Bay Area. Pique will also include a ground-floor coworking lounge, smart food lockers, private study pods on each floor and bike/scooter storage and charging stations. On the third floor, a space called the Community Terrace is designed for social engagement.

Providence, Rhode Island-based Gilbane Development is the real estate arm of Gilbane Inc., which was founded more than 150 years ago and is still privately owned by the Gilbane family. Gilbane Development has completed or has under way more than 25,000 units of housing and has done mixed-use developments, healthcare facilities, schools and government facilities.

The company is quite active in the student housing space. In November, it partnered with Canyon Partners Real Estate to provide a preferred equity investment in the development of Aer, a 375-unit project in Austin.

Also last month, Gilbane formed a joint venture with CBRE Investment Management to acquire six student housing properties encompassing nearly 3,000 beds.

Student housing still hot

Enrollment at UC Berkeley, as at many major universities, has been rising in recent years, driving the need for student housing in the area. Total undergraduate and graduate enrollment at UC Berkeley during the 2024-25 academic year is 45,882, according to the university. In 2014-15, the grand total was 37,581.

Though the pace of national rental growth and development has eased somewhat, student housing remains a favored property type and is in high demand. Preleasing slowed throughout 2023-24, outpacing last year’s record trend for the first five months of the season, but slowing later, according to Yardi Matrix.

Overall student housing occupancy came in at 94.5 percent in September 2024, some 10 basis points lower than a year earlier, Yardi Matrix reports. Preleasing for fall 2025 made a quick start, reaching 10.2 percent in September based on limited data, with four schools enjoying greater than 25 percent preleased in the first months of leasing.

Rent per bed for the 200 schools that Yardi Matrix tracks was $896 in September, down from a peak of $901 per bed in May. Rent growth was 4.2 percent year-over-year in September, which is lower than the record 6.8 percent rent growth during the 2022-23 season, but nevertheless well above the 12-month average of 2.6 percent from 2019 to 2022.