Tower Life Residences Converts a 1929 San Antonio Landmark to 244 Apartments

San Antonio’s most recognizable pre-war tower is becoming apartments, and half of them are meant to be affordable.

The Tower Life Building went up in 1929 as the Smith-Young Tower, thirty-one storeys of Art Deco and neo-Gothic brick and terra cotta on a bend of the San Antonio River. McCombs Enterprises bought it in 2022 from descendants of construction magnate H.B. Zachry and partnered with investor Jon Wiegand and developer Ed Cross on the conversion.

Project Scope

The building yields 242 to 244 market-rate and affordable units, including five penthouse-level units at the top. Riverwalk-facing retail is planned at the base. Units get smart-home systems, custom millwork and whole-home audio.

Front Porch Design Group and Alamo Architects are the architects and Jordan Foster Construction is the general contractor. J Jeffers and Co. is the historic tax credit and capital partner, with financing from the National Trust Community Investment Corporation. The project runs on federal historic tax credits, and fifty percent of the units are targeted to qualify as affordable under city definitions. Leasing was slated to begin in 2026.

Why It Matters

Office-to-residential conversions work when the floor plate is narrow enough to daylight both sides of a unit. A 1929 tower designed before fluorescent lighting and mechanical ventilation is close to ideal for this, because it had to be. Every office needed an operable window.

The harder part is the tax credit stack. Federal historic credits require the rehabilitation to meet the Secretary of the Interior’s Standards, which constrains window replacement, storefront changes and anything visible on the exterior. Combining that with a fifty percent affordable target on a thirty-one storey conversion is the part other developers will study.

Project Team & Details