SoCal Apartments Set for Conversion to Affordable After $75M Sale
Developer Towbes Group sold the suburban property about a decade after completing it
By Nick Trombola February 20, 2026 4:40 pm
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Residential activity is picking up pace in Santa Barbara County alongside a recent influx of tech and aerospace investment.
Local developer The Towbes Group has traded Hancock Terrace, a 272-unit multifamily complex in Santa Maria, Calif., for $75 million. Housing nonprofit Step Up Housing, together with Sack Capital Partners and Align Financing Partners, purchased the building and plan to convert it into affordable housing, according to Institutional Property Advisors (IPA) broker Joseph Grabiec.
IPA’s Grabiec, Kevin Green and Gregory Harris represented the seller in the deal and procured the buyers. Hancock Terrace, completed in 2016, is one of the largest suburban multifamily assets to trade hands in the county in the past 25 years, Green said in a statement.
Compared to Greater Los Angeles, residential investment and development is usually muted in Santa Barbara County, although activity has begun to change. In mid-January, Canfield Development landed a $174 million construction financing package for the first phase of Blosser Ranch, a master-planned community in Santa Maria expected to feature 1,500 residential units.
In December 2025, Westview Capital Partners set new county records with its $116 million purchase of Kennedy Wilson’s 460-unit La Vista Apartments in Santa Maria. The deal set a new bar in the county for both sales price and number of units sold. Two years previously, Afton Properties set the previous sales price record with its $113.5 million purchase of the 318-unit Azure, also in Santa Maria.
Nick Trombola can be reached at ntrombola@commercialobserver.com.
