RALEIGH—New York-based real estate investment banking firm Joseph Merrill Capital just closed on a $48.2 million balance sheet loan execution for the refinancing of a 926,802-square-foot industrial and flex office portfolio in Raleigh, N.C. Affiliates of Equus Capital Partners, L.P., a leading private equity real estate fund manager, own and operate the portfolio.

“The lending environment continues to become increasingly competitive for high quality assets that are institutionally owned and maintained,” James Rizzi, managing principal at Joseph Merrill, tells GlobeSt.com. The interest rate on the Equus loan execution carries a rate sub 2.35%, is non-recourse, and provides prepayment flexibility.

Rizzi says he is seeing some national banks that are traditional recourse lenders transition to offer non-recourse lending programs to institutional and sophisticated sponsors such as Equus. The goal is to better diversify their client base and to capture new business in a market where non-recourse financing is highly sought after.