Owners of Keys Cafe expanding into Reno housing and restaurant market

With the dormitories at the University of Nevada Reno (UNR) currently at 121 percent of capacity, new housing projects are being built to accommodate the growing campus population.

One company that is helping create new housing opportunities in Reno is Pink Hill Properties, a company that has ties to South Lake Tahoe.

Pink Hill's co-CEOs Kevinn Pinkney and Garry Hill-Thomas both played basketball for the UNR Wolf Pack and later played professionally. Hill-Thomas is currently an assistant coach with the Reno Bighorns.

Pinkney and Hill-Thomas are also partners with South Lake Tahoe local Jeremy Gilpin in Keys Cafe LLC, owner of the popular diner, Keys Cafe.

In Pink Hill's newest project, The Towers at Pink Hill on Virginia Street across from the UNR campus, 53 residential units are being built on three stories above a ground floor which will have retail and restaurants. One of the restaurants going in will be a Keys Cafe, a much larger version of what started in South Lake Tahoe.

The Reno version will serve what they do so well on the south shore, along with a pizza bar and ice cream.

Gilpin said the new restaurant should be completed in August, 2017. This will be their third location. The second is inside Lake Tahoe Community College.

Gilpin partners with the two former basketball stars on the Keys Cafe portion of the business, while Pinkey and Hill-Thomas are behind the building. Gilpin said the other half of his team is constantly looking at investing in student housing and medium income housing, projects that can be funded through special USDA financing.

The Towers at Pink Hill in Reno is the duo's first property development project.

For more on the Reno housing portion, read this story ->