GID Investment Advisors Selling River North Apartment Tower

Gregory Bates is joining a herd of sellers in downtown Chicago’s multifamily market during a development dropoff and a surge in rents.

His Boston-based firm GID Investment Advisors hired CBRE brokers in August to sell Flair Tower, a 26-story, 197-unit apartment tower at 222 West Erie Street, CoStar reported. GID joined the ranks of firms offering up what amount to thousands of apartment units for sale downtown, providing a way for new investors to buy into a market that’s recording increasing rents due largely to a slowdown in multifamily construction.

It’s unclear how much GID will take for the sale of Flair Tower. The firm purchased it at the height of a booming Chicago market in 2011 for $85 million, but other recent sales of apartment towers in and around downtown have come with steep dropoffs from their previous values.

The 398-unit North Water Apartments, at 340 East North Water Street in Streeterville, hit the market in April. Miami-based Crescent Heights purchased the multifamily component of the building in June 2023 for $173 million ($435,000 per unit), a bargain compared to its $240 million trade in 2016. It’s unclear what the North Water property will sell for today, as it has competition nearby with another large listing.

The State Teachers Retirement System of Ohio also listed a Streeterville apartment building last month to join the pack of downtown multifamily assets on the market.

In River North, adjacent to Streeterville, Flair Tower is 97 percent leased among its apartment offerings and the tower’s retail base is fully leased. There are 184 parking spaces as well as a pool, clubroom, updated lobby and other amenities. A $60 million loan from Berkeley Point Capital was taken out on the tower in December 2016, five years after GID’s acquisition, according to Cook County property records.

The tower was built in 2010 and current asking rents start at $3,424 per unit, or $3.61 per square foot.

GID currently has more than $31.1 billion in real estate assets under its management, including more than 56,000 apartment units and 27 million square feet of commercial space. Bates is CEO, and W. Gardner Wallace is chairman.— Eric Weilbacher