NEW YORK CITY-With affordable housing tax credits allocated in the early 1990s now approaching their expiration date, a group of public, private and nonprofit officials in New York City have taken action to preserve 447 residential units in Harlem. Developer L+M Development Partners Inc., in a single joint venture with the Harlem Congregations for Community Improvement Inc. (HCCI), collaborated with the city's Department of Housing Preservation and Development, the New York City Housing Development Corporation, the Goldman Sachs Urban Investment Group, and the state’s Department of Homes and Community Renewal on the closing of a $75 million tax credit restructuring that will ensure 14 residential buildings in the Bradhurst section of Harlem remain affordable.

The buildings--part of HCCI’s portfolio that was gut renovated in the 1990s--have reached the end of their 15-year Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) compliance period, according to L+M. The portfolio will now be repositioned with a new round of LIHTCs, as well as financing provided by HPD, HDC and HCR, says Rick Gropper, project manager for L+M, who tells GlobeSt.com the transaction is one of the first tax credit restructurings of its kind, and hopes the deal will serve as a national model for other developers and city and state agencies. “There are a couple hundred thousand units in the US that are in the same situation where you have expiring tax credit buildings in need of major capital improvements,” Gropper says. “My hope is that this restructuring will be a catalyst for the thousands of units in the similar situations around the country.”

The 14 buildings in the portfolio are scattered between West 145^th Street and West 153^rd Streets between Seventh and Eighth Avenues in Upper Manhattan. Over time, the transaction will allow the apartments to remain affordable for low-income families for the next 30 years, while providing the capital needed to complete a comprehensive physical rehabilitation of the portfolio. Gropper says HCCI was “integral” in the rejuvenation of the neighborhood, and L+M came into the picture because the local nonprofit needed a “strong partner to help them maintain these buildings and assure that the buildings could withstand another 15 years,” he added.