GID, Henley scores $1.2B in construction loans for Waterline Square

Partners putting up more than $1B in equity in UWS waterfront project

GID's James Linsley and renderings of Waterline Square
GID's James Linsley and renderings of Waterline Square

Despite a tight lending market, the developers of the recently rebranded Waterline Square on the Upper West Side have been able to lock down $2.3 billion in construction financing.

GID Development [TRDataCustom] and its partner Henley Holding Co., a subsidiary of the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, have borrowed $1.243 billion from lenders Wells Fargo, HSBC USA, J.P. Morgan Chase and the National Bank of Abu Dhabi, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The loan package — one of the biggest of the cycle — comes as traditional lenders pull back on financing and developers turn increasingly toward alternative sources of funding like the EB-5 visa program.

“They are really bucking the trend by getting a construction loan today,” Chilton Realty International president Ed LaGrassa, who works on equity placements and structures joint ventures, told the Journal. “Because of a lack of construction lending available, a lot of projects aren’t going anywhere at the moment.”

The developers are also contributing more than $1 billion in equity for the 1,132-unit megaproject formerly known as Riverside Center.

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The project, which includes three towers between West 59th and West 61st streets near the Hudson River, is expected to be complete in 2019. The buildings will have rental apartments on the lower floors and condominiums above.

The developers tapped Rafael Vinoly, Richard Meier & Partners Architects and Kohn Pedersen Fox to design the towers, which range from 34 to 38 stories.

GID recently filed condo-offering plans with the state Attorney General’s Office for two of the buildings.

Ziel Feldman’s HFZ Capital Group is also in talks to nab a loan for about $1.2 billion to finance construction its $1.9 billion mixed-use project in Chelsea, dubbed “The Eleventh.” [WSJ] Rich Bockmann