NEW YORK CITY-Over the span of a few short years, Ira Zlotowitz and Abraham Bergman has transformed their business – Eastern Union Commercial – into a nationally-recognized real estate mortgage firm. And during the second quarter alone, the firm experienced a 150% increase in loan closings compared with Q2 2011, GlobeSt.com has confirmed.
The boutique mortgage brokerage – with its corporate headquarters in Manhattan and local offices in Brooklyn, NY, Howell, NJ, Bethesda, MD and Philadelphia – finalized more than 100 transactions in Q2 alone, the highest number of loans the company has ever closed within a single three-month period – a sign that a pick up in lending is beginning to take place.
“Interest rates are at an all-time low, and with low rates, there are better valuations,” Zlotowitz tells GlobeSt.com. “Now with healthier values combined with low interest rates, that’s the most obvious that’s the driving force. Banks are opening up, and when banks are more comfortable and they are healthier, they are able to start lending again.”
From retail, multifamily, industrial and office, Eastern Union has run the gamut of different deals across all property sectors in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic regions in Q2. Noteworthy transactions include an $11.5 million bridge loan for an eight-building, 322-unit apartment complex in Latham, MA, which was financed at 7.5% and will convert to a standard 10-year Greystone Fannie Mae DUS loan following a capital improvement program. Further down in New Haven, Eastern Union arranged an $11 million, seven-year loan package for the refinance and acquisition of a 73-unit, mixed-use portfolio financed by Investors Bank at 4.375%.
In New Jersey, the firm arranged a seven-year, $8.8 million loan to refinance a 166-unit multifamily portfolio in Orange and East Orange with Arbor Bank. And besides Eastern’s traditional multifamily deals, Zlotowitz says there is a lot of “shake up in movement” in the healthcare sector, as evidenced by the firm’s $7 million loan to refinance a medical office building in Toms River in Ocean County. The seven-year financing, with a three-year option, was arranged by Peapack Gladstone Bank, at 3.95%.
At this rate, the firm is now on-pace to post its highest ever year-end totals, which Zlotowitz says is the result of several changes to the business that were implemented two years ago. “Now we are beginning to see the results,” he says. “We have a greater origination arm, we have better bank relationships and more banks than we have than the past and we have invested in a web-based system that gives brokers access everything at their fingertips full access whether they go. We are finding that when you take this all together, it’s been a great success.”
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