Headwaters Group Expanding Beyond Active Adult Into Full-service Senior Living

Four years ago, Ben Burke launched Headwaters Group with a plan to develop active adult communities.

Now, in anticipation of growing demand for senior living, the company is broadening its services to include independent living, assisted living and memory care, and new unit types such as cottages.

Denver-based Headwaters Group has grown steadily since its 2022 launch, with six communities as of 2026 with more planned in the future. The company now has nine team members, including Mason Baich, director of asset management; and Adam Herrmann, director of investments.

The company has added four active adult communities since last October in Colorado and Arizona, with active adult giant – and now independent living operator – Greystar slated to manage them.

Burke, a senior living veteran who formerly was president for Anthology Senior Living, is relying on the relationships he’s forged with operators, general contractors and investors to continue fueling the company’s acquisition and development push.

In 2026, Headwaters is in phase three of four planned since its launch. The company is delivering deals on-schedule and budget while hitting its rent and lease-up benchmarks.

“Phase one was starting a business, capitalizing it, finding a team, finding the capital partners. Phase two was finding the deals, closing them and starting to construct them,” Burke said. “Phase three is finishing them and getting a proof of concept, lease-up, rent discovery, asset management, and then phase four, rinse and repeat.”

Looking ahead, Headwaters has three independent living, assisted living and memory care projects slated to break ground later this year or next – all part of the company’s new acquisition and development program for full-service senior living communities. Headwaters is capitalizing its current growth through JVs with institutional partners and/or discretionary capital funds.

“What we’ve proven is we are a very institutional investment group and developer who can deliver on time,” Burke told Senior Housing News. “If we can help our friends scale their businesses, that seems like a great win-win.”

Adding full-service communities to the mix

When Burke launched Headwaters, he initially set out to fill an opportunity in active adult. Now, he sees a similar opportunity to partner on and develop full-service senior living communities that include access to a care continuum.

Now as it was then, Burke and Headwaters are motivated by the value they can provide and what consumers want at the end of the day.

“There’s been so little supply of seniors housing, of any type, being added since Covid,” Burke said. “What you’re seeing is capital providers, buyers, coming to the market and saying, ‘I want to own senior housing,’ and there’s very little to buy.”

Burke said he always wanted to again explore developing full-service senior living communities, he just didn’t know when conditions would allow him to. Now is that time as replacement and acquisition costs trend ever-closer together, he added.

“We know what we can deliver for, and we know what people are buying for, and we think that there’s a positive margin,” he said.

That confidence is reflected in the product offerings Headwaters aims to include with new communities that encompass more services than active adult, and how the new communities are designed. The company is exploring adding cottages or patio homes to properties with other service types. One of its existing properties in Scottsdale, Arizona, has 10 active adult cottages that are nearly sold out in the four months after opening them.

Active adult properties are susceptible to age- and acuity-creep, according to Burke. That makes a campus setting with appropriately sized units of multiple types more ideal to a company like Headwaters.

“One of the most important things for residents moving into a senior living environment is knowing that they’re not going to have to move again,” he said. “In a campus setting, having active adult, especially in a patio home or cottage setting, is a no-brainer.”

Last year, the company also launched Aspendale, an elevated brand meant to help fulfill demand for active adult communities with upscale amenities like fitness centers, outdoor turf areas, creative arts studios, card rooms, great rooms with kitchens, resort-style pools, dining courtyards and dog parks. Units have energy efficient, stainless-steel appliances, stone countertops, custom closets and private balconies or patios and large windows.

On the active adult side, Headwaters still is targeting affordability for an “upper-middle-market” clientele “who’s making a lifestyle choice versus a healthcare or needs-based choice,” said Burke. Landing on a true middle-market price point is tougher for full-service senior living communities as they offer more services and therefore have a much higher overhead of costs to contend with.

Middle-market price points require scale and “for a business that can be repeatable and scalable, that upper middle is a pretty good spot,” Burke said.

“We think there’s a lot of opportunity in it today,” he added.

Headwaters is about 80% of the way through raising money for a new general partner fund, its second since launching. The fact that investors are happy and are seeking to work again with the company is evidence to Burke that “our relationships are driven by culture.”

“If there’s one thing that I’ve learned in my career, it’s that you want to work with people who you like and are smart,” he said. “If you have a good culture, you can solve a lot of problems.”

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