Construction has begun on what Goucher College and Edenwald Senior Living are calling Maryland's first university retirement community, a development that will let older adults live on a college campus with the same access to classes, libraries and cultural events as traditional students. The project calls for three apartment towers rising on three acres leased from Goucher's Towson campus, part of a fast-growing national trend of colleges partnering with senior living operators.
Groundbreaking Follows a Fast Sellout
As reported by The Business Journals, the senior living community is going up directly on the Goucher College campus, with Edenwald building out the towers while residents gain the ability to audit college classes and tap into the same facilities and events available to students. Demand for the new apartments arrived fast: Edenwald president and CEO Mark Beggs told Senior Housing News, “We hit our financial goal in seven weeks. We completely sold out in four months.”
According to Goucher College, the project is billed as “the first university retirement community (URC) in Maryland” and will put more than 284,000 square feet of new construction on three acres of land leased from the college. Goucher's announcement describes 127 new apartments spread across three new 8- to 10-story towers, while the same Senior Housing News report put the count at 125 apartments across three towers — a discrepancy the available records do not resolve. Edenwald's own expansion website adds yet another layer of detail, describing Tower 1 at 11 stories with 47 residences and Towers 2 and 3 each at eight stories with 39 residences apiece, for 125 residences total.
What Residents Get for Living on Campus
Floor plan sizes are reported differently across sources as well. Goucher's announcement lists units ranging from 1,300 to 1,800 square feet, while Edenwald's expansion site puts the range at 1,100 to 2,100 square feet. What is consistent is the lifestyle pitch: Goucher says residents will have the ability to participate in international study abroad programs, audit Goucher College classes, and get access to live performing arts, lectures, and other cultural events on campus for free.
The college says programming was set to be piloted with current Edenwald residents during the 2024-2025 academic year, with the first intergenerational study-abroad trip planned as an arts and culture experience to Scotland in the summer of 2025. Edenwald's relationship with the college isn't brand new, either — Senior Housing News reports the community currently operates under a 99-year lease with the university. The expansion itself still needs sign-off beyond groundbreaking: Edenwald's own project page states that the expansion is subject to final approval by the Maryland Department of Aging.
Part of a Bigger National Shift
Maryland's first entry joins a wave of similar projects nationwide. Senior Housing News reports that between 85 and 100 senior living communities currently have some form of formal relationship with a university campus, and consultant Andrew Carle told the outlet that number could “easily quadruple” in the coming years. Carle also said that in 2026 alone he was working with five universities on new projects, with another five in early outreach stages.
The financial upside for colleges can be significant. Carle told Senior Housing News that university retirement communities can produce non-tuition revenue anywhere between $1 million and $3 million per year for partnering institutions — a notable incentive at a time when, per the same report, units under construction represented just 0.4% of total senior living inventory in the first quarter of 2026. As Marketplace notes, there are currently close to 90 university retirement communities nationwide, up from just one or two in the 1980s, typically giving residents 55 and older access to classes, sporting events, and free run of libraries and dining halls.
How Goucher Compares to Other Campus Communities
Other schools have already built out similar arrangements at a larger scale. Arizona State University's Mirabella, a 20-story facility on the Tempe campus, opened with 239 independent-living apartments and 59 health care units as part of a $252 million project, according to Arizona State University. ASU says Mirabella residents can take classes, access the campus's amenities, and stay close to cultural and sports events.
The Baltimore Banner notes that Lasell Village in Massachusetts and Mirabella at ASU in Arizona are among the other established university retirement communities around the country, while McKnight's Senior Living reports that institutions including the University of Notre Dame, Stanford University, the University of Texas at Austin, Arizona State University, Berry College and Purchase College have all pursued similar senior living partnerships. Argentum reports that roughly 70% of Belmont Village Albany's current residents are affiliated with UC Berkeley, illustrating how closely some of these communities end up tied to their host campuses.
