$50M Morena Vista Underway

SAN DIEGO-A new multifamily project is underway in San Diego and it’s something of an endangered species—an apartment only project. Morena Vista, a two-building 355,704-sf mixed-use project is being developed as a for-rent property, an extreme rarity in an area where condominiums have been the product of choice. The property will build out at some $50 million and be completed around June 2006 in the Linda Vista area of San Diego.San Diego-based CityLink Investment Corp. is the project’s developer and has teamed with the New York office of Boston-based Tremont Realty Capital LLC on the project. The project brings the New York office of Tremont Realty Capital into the San Diego area for the first time. The company arranged a 12-year, $44.5 million loan as part of the financing on the project. “The deal presented several challenges, including a ground lease with two municipals agencies,” says John Raggio, managing director with Tremont. Raggio adds that as part of the project, the developer, CityLink Investment Corp., “had to provide improvements to an adjacent trolley car station.”Raggio says “with all the condo conversions, this is a class A apartment complex. It’s going to be maintained as apartment product.” He says there’s “no limit on the upside of the potential of this project.”Morena Vista has two buildings and counts 185 residential units. In the first building will be 22 loft apartments over 17,500 sf of ground floor retail. “There’s some pre-leasing taking place,” Raggio tells Globest.com. He couldn’t comment on who is under negotiation, but says the potential renters are in the restaurant and beverage industry. The second building calls for 163 apartment units built on four floors. The apartments rest over three floors of subterranean parking. In addition, 10% of the residential units have been set aside for affordable housing, according to Raggio.Tremont Realty Capital LLC is a national direct lender and real estate investment-banking firm headquartered in Boston, with offices in Annapolis, Hartford, New York, Chicago, McLean and Scottsdale. Raggio says the company is looking at additional partnering opportunities in San Diego with CityLink Investment Corp.