Colorado firm buys most of Utah's Henr..

Real estate • Oakwood Homes says the acquisition will allow it to have more reach into Salt Lake City.

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Henry Walker Homes, a major player in residential construction in Utah and Colorado, is selling a large chunk of its business to Colorado's largest privately owned homebuilder, Denver-based Oakwood Homes.

Oakwood Homes founder and CEO Pat Hamill announced the deal Thursday, casting its acquisition of Henry Walker Homes' northern Utah assets for more than $75 million as a move toward expanding into Salt Lake City metropolitan markets.

Henry Walker Homes, Hamill said, "is already established in Utah with a solid reputation in the area."

The transaction, discussed since last fall and completed Wednesday, was funded with capital investments from Minneapolis-based Värde Partners and Mountain Real Estate Capital, headquartered in Charlotte, N.C.

The sale carves out Henry Walker's extensive operations in Utah's northern counties and puts them under Oakwood ownership, with John Stubbs, current president of Henry Walker Homes heading up Oakwood's new Utah division.

Henry Walker's business in northern Colorado and southern Utah, including a high-end retirement home-building operation centered in St. George, will be spun off into a separate company, to be led by Henry Walker Homes founder and CEO Colin Wright.

With its market shares along the Colorado Front Range, including Denver and Colorado Springs; Omaha, Nebraska; as well as in northern Utah, Oakwood sold 436 homes last year.

With this purchase, company officials said they hope to more than double that number in 2014, a goal that would make Oakwood the 33rd largest U.S. homebuilder.

tsemerad@sltrib.com

Twitter: @tony_semerad

Colorado firm buys most of Utah's Henry Walker Homes