AvalonBay Sells Big in DC
After getting its co-acquisition of Archstone out of the way in February, AvalonBay is roaring out of March, selling two big DC-area apartment complexes over the past few weeks for almost $400M. (They wanted to get some extra cash and shed some weight before beach season.)
The two complexes (Crystal House in Crystal City, above, and Avalon Decoverly in Rockville) total 1,392 units and sold for a total of $398M. CBRE's Andy Boyer, whose team helped arrange the $262.5M sale of Crystal House, says that the buying partnership--a JV between Roseland Mack-Cali and a fund managed by UBS--was attracted to the excess land included in the sale, which is already approved for 252 new units. He says the new owners could break ground by early 2014 on a new project. Andy adds that AvalonBay's big sales could signal the beginning of a seller's market: There's little available product locally with lots of capital in hot pursuit, which will result in some new offerings coming on line soon.
