Construction crews have broken ground on a 348-unit apartment complex at 3320 Hemphill Street in Fort Worth's South Hemphill Heights neighborhood, with the new development named Sorella designed to fit the character of south Fort Worth. The project is being built by Pivotal Residential, described as an Alabama-based real estate investment firm, which purchased the land in 2025 according to a company representative and broke ground on the market-rate complex in June 2026.
According to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Sorella apartments are expected to be available to rent by late 2027. That timeline lines up closely with a Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation filing showing a scheduled construction start of January 1, 2026, and a completion date of January 1, 2028, for the site, according to a project record reviewed by zabalist.com. That same filing lists an estimated construction cost of $33,466,000 and describes the project as privately funded, covering 350,436 square feet of net space. Project records list Fort Worth Residences, LLC as the owner and developer of record, and the filing shows the project was registered with TDLR on September 18, 2025.
A Scrapped $65 Million Predecessor
The Hemphill Street address has a complicated recent history. A previous proposal called Livano Victory Forest was planned for the same 3320 Hemphill St. site in 2023, projected to include 357 units at a cost of $65 million, according to state filings cited by the Star-Telegram. Those plans were scrapped in favor of the new development that became Sorella.
Before Livano Victory Forest fell through, Fort Worth City Council had approved a tax abatement agreement for a separate developer, LIV Developments, which had planned to invest $72 million in the site. But LIV Developments never purchased the land from the Sisters of St. Mary of Namur, Western Province, and that deal collapsed. Pivotal Residential does not plan to seek a tax break for Sorella, a contrast to the abatement once granted for the earlier proposal.
Permits and a Regional Track Record
City of Fort Worth permit records show at least 25 permits on file at the Hemphill Street address, with the 25 most recent issued between September 2025 and June 2026, per the zabalist.com project record. Pivotal Residential describes itself on its own website as a private, real-estate investment firm focusing on community development within the high-end residential space. The firm says that since 2016, its team has sourced, entitled and developed more than 3,300 units with $650 million in total investment.
Pivotal Residential also has the Casona apartments project in Grand Prairie, a 305-unit Class A community it is developing alongside Novu Residential Group, according to Multi-Housing News. That project, located at 3800 Robinson Road on 18 acres of a 33-acre wooded site, is slated for completion by spring 2027.
A Corridor in Flux
Sorella joins a wave of activity along Hemphill Street and in south Fort Worth more broadly. Nearby, CRG Development hosted a groundbreaking ceremony for the 401 Hemphill Apartments in the Near Southside neighborhood, a five-story, 242-unit building that includes 4,500 square feet of first-class amenity space, according to Cadence McShane. The corridor has also seen disagreements over a proposed townhome rezoning project in 2023, and the city is currently holding off on moving forward with a broader Hemphill rezoning effort that would create a mixed-use district called Near Southside General Urban, allowing both residential and commercial uses, as reported by Fort Worth Inc.
The area's housing mix extends beyond market-rate towers. The Maren Grove affordable housing apartments opened inside the former Our Lady of Victory Academy building at 801 W. Shaw St., a project that according to Fort Worth Report paired adaptive reuse of the historic academy with a four-story multifamily addition and 90 low-income units. Elsewhere in the city, zoning commissioners have approved an 81-unit mixed-income senior housing complex at 5733 Craig St. and a 300-unit multifamily complex on more than 13 vacant acres at 10200 Brewer Blvd., the outlet's reporting shows, while a community land trust is planning hundreds of affordable units on a former seminary property near McCart Avenue and West Seminary Drive.
For now, Sorella stands as the latest bet on the Hemphill corridor's future, with Pivotal Residential aiming to open the doors to renters by late 2027 even as the surrounding zoning debate and affordability questions remain unresolved.
