3L Lists Multifamily Portfolio Near University of Chicago

Local firm 3L Real Estate is searching for buyers for a four-building multifamily housing portfolio near the University of Chicago.

The buildings, marketed by Colliers, total 533 units, and the brokerage is playing up the possibility of running the properties as a student housing business or repositioning it as affordable housing through tax credits. They could also remain market-rate apartments.

It is unclear why 3L is putting the portfolio on the market. The firm did not respond to requests for comment.

The buildings are located at 5401 South Cornell Street, 5748 South Blackstone Avenue, 5540 South Hyde Park Boulevard and 5445 South Ingleside Avenue. The latter three are carrying a combined $15 million loan from KeyBank that 3L took out on the buildings in 2017, while KeyBank also holds a $10 million mortgage that 3L borrowed for the Cornell Street property in 2021.

Built between 1925 and 1930 the buildings’ rents range from $748 to $917 a month. They are 88 to 99 percent occupied. Colliers is marketing them as a value-add opportunity due to availability of historic tax credits available for rehabilitating such properties.

A target price has not been made public but 3L is offering to sell the properties individually or as a portfolio. They’re also among another South Side housing portfolio that recently hit the market.

Wisconsin-based investor Trinity Flood is marketing a three-building, 208-unit apartment complex built around the same time for $18.6 million, meaning the landlord is trying to exit the property for about the same price it took to acquire them. The buildings are at 6916 South Clyde Avenue, 7038 South Chappel Avenue, and 7500 South South Shore Drive, and Flood picked up the properties for $18.4 million in 2020.

While student housing is not the biggest sector in real estate, it has become one of the strongest.

The top 25 student housing owners have just under 660,000 beds across 1,142 properties, according to Student Housing Business, which covers the field. But real estate’s biggest investors are here: Blackstone’s $12.8 billion acquisition in 2022 of American Campus Communities gave the asset class some gravitas.

One of the sector’s biggest players is based in Chicago. Motorola heirs Bob, Christopher and Michael Galvin launched the firm Harrison Street Real Estate Capital in 2005, focusing on “demographic-driven real estate.” They have since invested in 118,300 beds, according to a rundown of investments on the company’s website.

3L’s student housing portfolio isn’t the firm’s only big listing on the market. The firm is also currently working with JLL to sell the historic Ebony Jet building at 200 South Michigan Avenue. The building once served as the headquarters for Ebony and Jet Magazines but was converted to apartments that kept the property’s 1960s and 70s design aesthetic.