Common managing Nuveen apartment buildings in Fort Lauderdale, LA

Common said 100% of new leases have been handled remotely since pandemic began

Brad Hargreaves
Brad Hargreaves

Co-living operator Common is expanding its third-party property management.

The company signed onto 575 units owned by Nuveen in South Florida and Los Angeles, taking over property management and leasing from Lincoln Property Company.

Common recently took over management of the Edge, a 331-unit building at 475 North Federal Highway in Fort Lauderdale, and will begin managing Stella, a 244-unit building at 13488 Maxella Avenue in L.A.’s Marina Del Rey, in July.

Common founder and CEO Brad Hargreaves said the company isn’t “getting away from co-living,”  as it still has about 10,000 co-living beds under development. In South Florida, Common has 1,500 beds signed and under development, and in L.A., it has 2,300 beds in the pipeline, a spokesperson said.

Common recently announced it launched a brand geared towards workforce housing, called Noah, short for “naturally occurring affordable housing.” Common began with managing 500 units over five properties in Hampton Roads and Winchester, Virginia in January.

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The Fort Lauderdale and Los Angeles properties are some of Nuveen’s largest Class A apartment buildings in the U.S., according to a press release.

Nuveen parent TIAA paid $114.4 million for the Edge in Fort Lauderdale in 2016, property records show. It paid $167.3 million for the L.A. property in 2013.

Hargreaves said that before the pandemic, Common was signing 30 percent of its leases remotely, either online or via phone. Since the pandemic hit the U.S. in mid-March, 100 percent of leases have been signed through Common’s online portal or via phone, he said.

Common’s technology aims to make the property management process more efficient, generally reducing an owner’s expenses through automation and centralization of processes, Hargreaves added. That includes streamlining maintenance requests and redirecting all leads to a call center.