This Week's Philadelphia Deal Sheet
Livingston Street Capital, a private equity firm that counts age-restricted multifamily properties among its focus areas, has added another such property in one of the most desirable submarkets of the Philadelphia region.
The firm, which has offices in New York and the Main Line suburb of Radnor, has acquired Canvas at Valley Forge, a 231-unit apartment building for residents aged 55 and up in King of Prussia, from The Bozzuto Group for $112.5M, according to Montgomery County property records.
Bozzuto delivered the 415K SF Canvas in 2018 as part of the multiphase, multideveloper network of buildings dubbed the Village at Valley Forge. Its sale of Canvas, which contains 147 one-bedroom units and 84 two-bedroom units, was recorded with Montgomery County on Feb. 25. Livingston Street financed the transaction with a $67M loan from an affiliate of Newmark Knight Frank, according to Reonomy data.
FINANCING
Rose Valley Capital, an affiliate of Brooklyn, New York-based private equity firm Hampshire Properties, has secured a $73M loan from Natixis Corporate & Investment Banking to finance the acquisition of the Mansion at Bala, a 276-unit apartment building at 4700 City Ave. The property is on the Philadelphia side of the roadway that represents the line between Philly and Bala Cynwyd, the closest of the Main Line suburbs.
The loan, arranged by Berkadia Commercial Mortgage, carries a five-year term at a floating rate. The Mansion at Bala was built in 2010 with a mix of one-, two- and three-bedroom units with an average area of more than 1K SF. A sale price has not been announced, and no recent sale has appeared in Philadelphia property records.
CONSTRUCTION
Private equity firm KBS, one of the largest office owners in the world, has completed a series of renovations at 1000 Continental Drive in King of Prussia, a six-story, 205K SF office property originally built in 2007 and occupied by a handful of mainly financial services tenants. An Avison Young project and construction management team led by principal Jeffrey Heller led the renovations, the biggest of which is a multipurpose conference center with casual gathering spaces.
Mint House is nearing completion at its redevelopment of the multifamily portion at the historic Divine Lorraine Hotel on North Broad Street into short-term rentals, which the company calls "flex multifamily." The former hotel was converted into an apartment building in 2017 by local developer Eric Blumenfeld, but over 100 of its units will once again be operated in the style of a hotel by Mint House when it opens for business in July. Mint House also completed redevelopment of a portion of the landmark Public Ledger Building on Independence Mall into 40 short-term rental units, which came online in May.
SALES
A joint venture of BrookWynn Capital Partners, Voyage Investments and Shift Capital has acquired a six-property, 36-unit multifamily portfolio in the neighborhood of Mantua from local landlord Haverford Square Properties for $5.3M. The six properties are split into two three-building chunks, both on the 3800 block of Haverford Avenue, and all 36 apartments are of the one-bedroom, one-bath variety. The sale was brokered by Scope Commercial Real Estate Services as a value-add transaction, as only one-fifth of the properties have been recently renovated.
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Morgan Properties has acquired a nearly 5-acre parcel on the banks of the Schuylkill River in the suburb of Conshohocken for $8.5M, the Philadelphia Business Journal reports. The land is dubbed Millennium IV and sits adjacent to the Millennium I, II and III office buildings Morgan acquired in 2019 for its headquarters.
The Millennium IV site, which was sold by an affiliate of Terra Capital Partners, had its multifamily zoning stripped last year when the Conshohocken town board cracked down on apartment buildings. The site carries approval for a 150K SF office building, though Morgan has exclusively owned and operated multifamily properties for years.
PEOPLE
Key Bank Community Development Lending and Investment has hired Rada Lisitsa for the position of acquisitions transaction leader, with a focus on originating Low Income Housing Tax Credit transactions. Lisitsa comes from Wells Fargo, where she most recently served as capital markets relationship manager. She also co-founded the Women in Housing and Finance of Pennsylvania, a networking and professional development resource for women specifically in affordable housing and community development.
Based in Philadelphia, Lisitsa will report to Key Bank Real Estate Capital head of equity originations Victoria O'Brien.
