Carson Just Approved 1,115 New Homes at Imperial Avalon. What It Means for Rental Owners

Published July 25, 2026

Carson's council approved a development agreement for Imperial Avalon, a project of 764 multifamily units and 351 for sale townhomes, and Lennar has started selling the townhome piece as Manhattan Square from the mid $700,000s.

On April 7, 2026, the Carson City Council approved an amended and restated development agreement for Imperial Avalon through Ordinance 26-2606. The project on Avalon Boulevard carries 764 multifamily residential units in two buildings of up to four stories, plus 351 townhome units, along with restaurant space and public open space. Lennar has already begun selling the 351 townhomes as Manhattan Square from the mid $700,000s.

That is a lot of numbers in one paragraph, so let me slow down and hand you the version I see standing in the middle of it, because the headline number of 1,115 homes hides the part that actually matters to you as an owner.

What was actually approved

The Notice of Determination filed with the state lays out the pieces plainly. Imperial Avalon is a mixed use project at Avalon Boulevard and 213th Street. On the residential side it carries "764 multi-family residential units in two buildings of up to four stories each" and "351 attached/detached and stacked flat townhome units of up to three stories each." On top of that it adds 10,000 square feet of commercial restaurant space and 111,581 square feet of publicly accessible open space, which includes a park of at least 22,859 square feet.

The April 7 action was not the birth of the project. It was an amended and restated development agreement, meaning the original agreement was approved back in 2022 and the council came back this spring to update the terms. A development agreement is the contract between the city and the builder that locks in the rules the project gets built under, so this vote is the kind of milestone that tells you the thing is moving from paper toward dirt, not a first pass that could quietly die in committee.

For scale, this is a separate project from the Envision Carson homes I wrote about earlier. Carson is not getting one big development. It is getting several at once, and Imperial Avalon is one of the larger pieces on the Avalon Boulevard corridor.

For sale versus rental, and why the difference matters

Here is the part I want to be careful and honest about, because it is easy to read "1,115 new homes" and assume 1,115 new competitors for your tenants. That is not what the record supports.

The 351 townhome units are for sale, not rental. Lennar is selling them right now as Manhattan Square, and the company's own announcement describes 351 condominiums and townhomes across four home collections named Brixton, Chelsea, Madison, and Ellison, ranging from 1,229 to 2,066 square feet, two to four bedrooms, starting in the mid $700,000s at 500 Park Drive. Model homes were set to open on July 11, 2026. Those are homes people buy to live in, so they pull from the for sale market, not the rental pool.

The 764 multifamily units are the open question. The state filing calls them "multi-family residential units in two buildings," but it does not say whether they will be rental apartments or for sale condominiums. Multifamily buildings of that size are often rentals, but I am not going to state that as fact when the document I can verify does not. If you are underwriting a decision on the assumption that 764 new apartments are coming to Avalon Boulevard, that assumption is not yet confirmed in the public record. The honest answer is that the ownership structure of the larger building has not been made clear in the sources I can point you to.

What this means for your building

Start with what is certain. The 351 Manhattan Square townhomes are for sale in the mid $700,000s and above. If you own a rental house or a small building in Carson, those units are not renting against you. If anything, new for sale product at that price point tends to firm up the neighborhood, because buyers paying north of $700,000 want the area to hold its value, and that pressure runs in the same direction you do.

The 764 multifamily units are the piece to watch, and watch is the right verb. If those come to market as rentals, they would add real supply on the Avalon corridor over the build out period, which is measured in years, not months. New institutional apartments usually lease at the top of the local rent band with concessions to fill up fast, so the near term effect tends to land hardest on newer, higher priced units competing directly with them. A well kept house or a smaller building priced honestly for its condition serves a different renter than a brand new four story amenity building, and that separation is your buffer. If those 764 units come to market as for sale condominiums instead, the rental impact is smaller still.

The thing I would not do is overreact today. This is a development agreement, not a grand opening. The construction, leasing, or sales of the multifamily buildings will play out over years, and Carson still has no local residential rent control on apartments, which means you keep your normal flexibility to price to the market as it actually moves. My advice is to keep your unit genuinely competitive on condition and responsiveness, hold your rent to what the real Carson market supports rather than a number from two years ago, and let me track the multifamily piece so you hear about it from me before you feel it in a vacancy.

Common questions

Are all 1,115 homes going to be rentals I compete with?

No. The 351 townhomes are confirmed for sale as Lennar's Manhattan Square, starting in the mid $700,000s, so they draw from buyers, not renters. The 764 multifamily units are not confirmed as rental or for sale in the public record I can verify, so I would not assume they are all rentals.

When does this actually affect the Carson rental market?

Not immediately. The April 7, 2026 vote approved a development agreement, which is an early milestone, not a move in date. Construction and lease up on a project this size run over years, so the effect, if any, arrives gradually rather than all at once.

Does Carson have rent control that limits what I can charge?

Carson has no local residential rent control on apartments. Statewide rules such as California's rent cap and just cause protections can still apply depending on your property's age and type, so confirm your specific situation with a licensed professional before you set or raise a rent.

Last verified: July 25, 2026. Project figures come from the state Notice of Determination for Imperial Avalon and Lennar's Manhattan Square announcement; the rental versus for sale status of the 764 multifamily units is not confirmed in those sources. This is general information for property owners, not legal advice. Confirm any project details, rent rules, and pricing decisions with a licensed professional.

Kellie

Schofield Properties

323 Richmond Street, El Segundo, CA 90245

Topics: market, carson, south-bay, development, market

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