Senior Living Operator Kingsbury Debuts First Community ‘prototype’ In Larger Growth Plans

With the launch of a new senior living community, Kingsbury Living is advancing plans to develop multiple communities in Ohio in the coming years.

The Ohio-based senior living provider recently celebrated the opening of its first development in Lancaster, Ohio, a $28 million community that includes 81 assisted living apartments and plans to add villas down the road. Amenities include restaurant-style dining, a library, pub, bistro, fitness room and salon, along with various gathering rooms.

The community’s designers created a homelike setting complemented by high-quality dining options.

The concept serves as a “prototype” for a “statewide network” of Kingsbury senior living communities in Ohio, informed by the company’s experience operating in the Midwest.

“This concept will help us build out Kingsbury throughout the Ohio area,” Kingsbury CEO Bill Lemmon told Senior Housing News. “Ohio represents the best Midwest values—family, community, hard word and trust. Those align with our values and it’s how we operate.”

Kingsbury is a relatively new senior living operator born from Danbury Senior Living, a Canton, Ohio-based senior living operator founded by Bill Lemmon and Dan DeHoff. In 2022, Danbury’s communities and naming rights changed hands before Lemmon and DeHoff founded Kingsbury.

According to public financial information, Toledo, Ohio-based real estate investment trust Welltower (NYSE: WELL) acquired 19 Danbury communities spanning 2,000 units in mid-2022 and transitioned the properties to StoryPoint Senior Living, which currently manages them.

Now at Kingsbury, Lemmon serves as CEO and DeHoff as principal of Kingsbury Living alongside President Andy Harpster, who previously served as COO at Danbury between 2013 and 2023.

“This gives us a chance to look at what we should be doing in the future and we are executing on that,” Harpster said.

Kingsbury leaders have their sights set on new development across Ohio, designing purpose-built communities for a full continuum of care spanning independent living to memory care on highly amenitized campuses with lifestyle engagement and activities.

Currently, Kingsbury communities will be managed through a third-party management agreement with Traditions Management until Kingsbury launches its own operating platform.

“People start management companies when they aren’t happy with an operator,” Lemmon said. “We’re happy with ours.”

The company’s leaders are targeting markets for growth in close proximity to Ohio cities including Columbus and Cleveland. Lemmon told SHN these future communities could include even larger independent living footprints, jumping from unit counts in the 80s to upwards of 150 IL units with assisted living and memory care components.

“All of our future sites have some component of independent living villas around them,” Harpster said, indicating the need for expanding entry points into senior living for older adults that are still active but maybe want to downsize.

“We take that decision very personally with them, and try to make that transition on aging as seamless as possible,” he added.

The company has approximately a half dozen sites zoned and under ownership, with the company breaking ground this month in North Canton, Ohio. Given Kingsbury leaders’ past experience in developing senior living communities,

Lemmon noted that the company frequently reviews site offers for future development despite tough conditions.

While conditions on development remain challenging currently, Harpster said the Kingsbury pipeline aims to bring communities online over the next three to five years due to the “critical shortage” of senior living options as demographic-driven demand spikes.

“If we don’t start building right now, the country is going to have a real problem here in a few years,” Harpster added.

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