Eastside MultiFamily Fetches Over $200K Per Unit

KIRKLAND, WA-Chelsea at Juanita Village, a 196-unit upscale apartment community here that includes 20,750 sf of retail space has changed hands for $48.6 million. The year-old complex consists of two five-story buildings and a two-story loft building on 3.3 acres within Juanita Village, an 11-acre master-planned redevelopment at the intersection of Northeast 124th Street and 100th Avenue Northeast. The complex is 97% occupied at net effective rental rates of about $1.70 per sf.The seller is the developer, Seco Developments Inc. of Bellevue. The new owner is Grosvenor, an international property development and investment firm with plans to accumulate more than 1,000 units in the region. James Delmotte, the company’s Vancouver, BC-based director of acquisitions, tells GlobeSt.com that in two weeks the company will close on a second Eastside acquisition, Chateau Creste, a 90-unit apartment complex for which it will pay about $7.5 million. The broker in the Chelsea deal, Dave Schumacher of Columbia Partners, tells GlobeSt.com that the sale price breaks down about $41.5 million for the residential component and about $7 million for the retail. Delmotte says the blended capitalization rate is about 6%.Unlike Chelsea, Delmotte says Chateau Creste is “more of a repositioning” that will require additional investment for new paint, carpets and kitchens. The proforma capitalization rate is about 7.75%, says Delmotte.Seco principal Michael Christ was not available for comment on the sale or its future plans at Juanita Village. Seco owns the last remaining development parcel at Juanita Village, which is slated to contain another 200 apartment units and additional retail space. At build out, all of Juanita Village will have about 88,000-sf of retail and about 600 apartments and townhouses built by several developers, including Avalon Bay Communities, which is under construction for a 211-unit apartment complex next to Chelsea that will include 18,700 sf of ground-floor retail space and 23 townhouses. As well, Trace & Associates of Issaquah recently completed an 11,900-sf retail building at 98th Avenue Northeast and Northeast 117th Place that will include a mix of tenants including a Thai restaurant, a sports bar, a dry cleaner and a tanning salon.