Landsea Homes Corp. (Nasdaq: LSEA) has been advancing its plans to become among the nation’s top 10 homebuilders with the help of Chief Legal Officer Franco Tenerelli.
The Dallas-based homebuilder, formerly in Newport Beach, has set its sights on markets increasing in popularity due to their affordability.
“People are leaving some of the higher tax states, like New York, and venturing to where it’s a little more friendly on the pocketbook,” Tenerelli told the Business Journal.
Landsea is no stranger to the practice of moving to a less costly area. CEO John Ho in March attributed Texas’ lower cost of living for the company’s move from Newport Beach to Dallas.
While Ho relocated to Dallas along with a portion of Landsea’s corporate team, the company still counts about 100 employees in Orange County, including Tenerelli.
Tenerelli was honored last November at the Business Journal’s General Counsel Awards in the Public Company category.
His work at Landsea includes helping the company pass $1 billion in revenue and go public in early 2021. Prior to Landsea’s Dallas move, the company was the most valuable publicly traded homebuilder based in OC.
At press time, shares in the company were $8.36 a share, giving it a $316 million market cap.
Landsea has been busy building out its Texas portfolio after settling in the Lone Star State.
The company in August acquired 84 finished lots at the master-planned Lariat community in Liberty Hill. The neighborhood will consist of 84 single-family homes, ranging from 1,500 to 2,200 square feet.
Landsea’s Lariat deal follows the company’s acquisition of 38 lots in Avery Centre in the Austin suburb of Round Rock, more than 20 miles southeast of Liberty Hill.
Avery Centre, another master-planned community, spans 1,200 acres. The neighborhood includes a Class A business complex, and has a parks and trail system planned for its second phase of development.
“Our focus has primarily been the smile states,” Tenerelli said, referring to Sunbelt markets like Arizona, Florida, Louisiana and New Mexico, among others.
Landsea specifically “targets areas that have really good homebuilding fundamentals, which are a strong job market, good schools and good infrastructure,” Tenerelli said.
Round Rock is one of those areas, “thanks to its highly regarded independent school district, great local tech job market, and abundance of public parkland,” Texas Division President Vince Ruffino said in a statement.
