Blackstone is dipping into North Lauderdale with a $14 million acquisition of the Cross Keys Apartments.
An entity managed by top executives of New York-based Blackstone acquired the garden-style multifamily project at 1850-2100 Southwest 81st Avenue. The Cornerstone Group, a Hollywood-based affordable housing developer, sold the 322-unit complex.
The deal equates to $43,478 per apartment.
An affiliate of Cornerstone paid $4 million for the property in 1998, according to records. The two-story buildings were completed in 1983. Cross Keys features one- to three-bedroom apartments with monthly rents between $1,248 and $1,776, according to Apartments.com.
Blackstone, a New York-based publicly traded global investment firm with $619 billion under management and led by founder, chairman and CEO Stephen A. Schwarzman, is making moves to solidify and expand its rental portfolio. The company is planning to invest $1 billion in expanding its backing of single-family rentals through Home Partners of America, a rent-to-own portfolio company Blackstone acquired last year.
Last month, as part of a $3.6 billion push into the multifamily market, Blackstone acquired real estate investment trust Bluerock Residential. Through the deal, Blackrock bought 30 rental properties with 11,000 total units, most of which are in Sun Belt markets like Atlanta, Phoenix and Orlando. In November, the firm also refinanced $1.1 billion in debt for a 13-property multifamily portfolio.
As South Florida’s multifamily market continues to garner high demand from renters, institutional investors and developers are going hog wild for existing apartment projects and development sites.
Recently, Kushner Companies and Aimco closed a $49 million deal for the site of a planned 3 million-square-foot multi-tower project in Fort Lauderdale that could include 1,300 apartments, office, retail and a hotel.
In Miami’s Wynwood neighborhood, Chicago-based Fifield Companies bought a 1.4-acre site for $19.5 million. The company plans to build an eight-story, 210-unit apartment project with 10,000 square feet of retail.
Also this month, An entity managed by Chaim Freeman, who heads Los Angeles-based commercial real estate firm Buff Management, paid $110.5 million for a 308-unit apartment complex in Sunny Isles Beach. And in Boynton Beach, Nuveen Real Estate acquired the 350-unit apartment complex, The District Boynton, for $125.9 million.