Apt. Sales Crawl as Institutional Players Take a Breather

ATLANTA-Institutional multifamily property investors remained on the sidelines in the first nine months as smaller properties valued at an average $1.5 million and containing less than 100 units dominated the apartment sales sector.

“Stock market volatility has yet to produce the huge wave of real estate investors that some analysts previously forecasted,” says Erik Pawloski, research director at locally based Bullock Mannelly Partners Inc. “With many institutional players sidelined in 2002, the investor profile shifted to smaller and more entrepreneurial buyers.”

Properties valued at less than $1.5 million accounted for half of last year’s 105 transactions. “At the same time, older properties traded at greater frequency,” Pawloski says. Transactions peaked at 190 in 2000.