RANDOLPH, MA-A 165-unit multifamily property that Equity Residential first put on the block in 2005 has finally changed hands. Tyrone Gardens has been purchased by Taymil Randolph LLC for $18.3 million, or about $111,000 per unit. Developed by Boston commercial real estate leader Thomas Flatley in 1961 and sold to Equity in the late 1990s, the complex on Francis Drive consists of eight three-story buildings and is 95% occupied.

"It is a good, clean class B property," says broker Terry Scott of Apartment Realty Advisors New England, whose firm represented the seller and procured the buyer, an affiliate of Taymil Partners LLC. Newton-based Taymil has amassed a portfolio of more than 2,000 apartments in Connecticut and Massachusetts since being founded in 2004 by real estate attorney Steven Astrove. Efforts to contact Astrove were not successful by press deadline, but Scott tells GlobeSt.com that the re-branded Francis Crossing offers a mix of stability and yield as a value-add investment.

Taymil "plans to reposition the property with a phased-in upgrade of the units," reports Scott, an ARA VP who negotiated the sale on a team with colleagues Jonathan Close, Richard Robinson and Travis D'Amato. The garden-style community features such amenities as a laundry facility, swimming pool and ample parking. The asset is also well positioned, according to Scott, citing favorable demographics of the heavily populated South Shore suburbs and access to Boston via Routes 24 and 28 and Interstates 93 and 95.

"Randolph is quite a strong market, and this transaction is representative of its vitality," says Scott. The asset likely would have traded earlier in the hot investment climate for multi-family real estate in Massachusetts, but "internal issues" that Scott would not elaborate on led Equity to pull Tyrone Gardens off the market soon after being initially offered for sale. One source says Equity was over-loaded on divestments for that period and briefly pulled back in a balancing maneuver. The complex was again put up for sale in late 2006 following the Chicago-based REIT's announced strategy to concentrate on newer properties.

ARA New England, part of the national multifamily brokerage group, has orchestrated several assignments locally this year, including the $55-million sale of a 243-unit apartment property in neighboring Canton to Chestnut Hill Realty earlier this spring. Other multifamily transactions ARA New England has completed this year are a $43-million sale in Lawrence and deals in Malden and Tewksbury.