The Eleanor opens in Rio Rancho as built-to-rent growth continues

The Eleanor has opened in Cabezon with 126 build-to-rent homes, adding another layer to Rio Rancho’s housing market at a time when city officials say housing costs are rising faster than income. The new JLM Living community sits on 10.6 acres at 2300 Westside Blvd. SE, near the Village at Rio Rancho and across from Presbyterian Rust Medical Center.

The project is designed to give renters a single-family feel without a mortgage. JLM Living describes the development as build-to-rent single-family homes with private yards, along with duplex units ranging from about 650 to 1,500 square feet. Current floor-plan listings show monthly rents starting around $1,750 for a one-bedroom duplex and climbing to roughly $2,900 to $3,450 for three-bedroom homes, depending on plan and availability.

The grand opening on May 21 included a ribbon-cutting, community tours, refreshments, music and giveaways, with festivities scheduled from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. and the ribbon-cutting set for 1 p.m. The opening marked a visible milestone for a project JLM Living first announced at groundbreaking on March 26, 2024. At that time, the company said the first 30 units were expected within 12 to 15 months, with full completion around the 20-month mark.

The financing behind the project also shows how strongly developers and lenders are betting on this part of the market. Trez Capital provided a $29.4 million construction loan for The Eleanor in May 2024, helping move forward JLM Living’s flagship New Mexico development.

The location matters as much as the product. Cabezon is not open land on the city’s edge; it is an established master-planned neighborhood where home construction began in 2004 and the final homes were built in 2018. That makes The Eleanor a new housing layer inside an already developed part of Rio Rancho, not a brand-new subdivision carved from scratch.

That kind of infill growth reflects the pressure now shaping the city’s housing decisions. Rio Rancho officials have said the city needs more housing options, and the city’s housing materials say the cost of housing is increasing faster than income. The city adopted an Affordable Housing Ordinance in December 2023, underscoring how central affordability has become to planning in Sandoval County’s largest city.

For residents who are priced out of ownership or do not want to buy, build-to-rent can widen the menu of choices. For the city, it raises a harder question: whether Rio Rancho can keep adding homes fast enough, and in the right places, without straining roads, schools, retail corridors and public services as growth continues.