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BETHESDA, MD-Transwestern has closed two deals that have pushed the firm's DC operations over the $750-million mark in financing for this year. One is a refinancing of 1701 Brightseat Rd., a 216,500-sf single tenant industry building in Landover owned by Finmarc Management Inc. The other deal is a $150-million portfolio sale that Clifford Mendelson, of Transwestern's Structured Finance Group, won't disclose other than to say the deal recently closed and some of the assets are in the DC area. "It was a very confidential transaction," he tells GlobeSt.com.

Also, there is one other deal pending that could push the firm over the $1-billion mark this year. "We are tracking to do $1.2 billion in financing if this transaction comes through," he says.The refinancing of Brightseat was an interesting transaction, he says. The Library of Congress' lease in the building had been set to expire within a year when Finmarc acquired the property from a limited partnership of retirees. Transwestern financed the original acquisition with bank funding; then went to the capital markets to refinance when the Library of Congress renewed its lease earlier this year, thus granting some certainty to the property. The refinancing closed at the end of September.

It was a 10-year, IO loan with a rate that is in the mid-80s over ten-year Treasury, he says. He notes that the Library of Congress' lease is set to expire again within five years, but the firm still received ten year IO financing. Mendelson assumes that lender Bear Sterns as well as Finmarc are banking that the government agency will stay put once more when the lease expires. The Library of Congress is using the property as an annex and the cost of moving, he says, would be monumental.