Abacus Capital Group Buys Discounted Bay Area Apartments

The Park Central Apartments in Concord sold to a New York-based landlord at a discount just as a mortgage on the property came due.

Abacus Capital Group purchased the 259-unit apartment complex at 1555 Galindo Street for nearly $98.3 million, the San Francisco Business Times reported. The price works out to $380,000 per unit.

Abacus bought the property from Walnut Creek-based Sequoia Equities, which acquired the complex in 2018 for $117 million. At the time of that acquisition, Sequoia Equities general partner Pat Reilly said it would invest $2.5 million to modernize the apartments and shared amenities, according to Urbanize. It financed the 2018 purchase with a seven-year, $74.3 million loan originated by Walker & Dunlop, which was scheduled to mature this month.

Abacus’ purchase marks the latest East Bay multifamily property sold for a discount to its previous price. Earlier this year, 1889 Harrison Street and 447 17th Street in Oakland sold for roughly half their assessed values; in March, an apartment building at 2055 Center Street in Berkeley traded hands for about 40 percent of its assessed value.

Abacus has been growing its presence in the Bay Area over the past year. The real estate investment firm bought the 80-unit Valencia and 64-unit Valencia Terrace apartment buildings in Vallejo last year for $27.5 million. The firm specializes in multifamily investments across the U.S. with more than $4.8 billion in investments and boasts more than 31,000 units in its portfolio.

Meanwhile, apartment development in the Bay Area has sunk to a 15-year low, the San Francisco Business Times reported, citing CoStar Group. South San Francisco is bucking that regional trend with three large-scale residential projects underway.

Trammell Crow Residential recently secured a $183 million construction loan for its 480-unit Alexan Icon project at 1587 and 1588 San Mateo Avenue. That development joins Syres Properties’ 400-unit development at 410 Noor Avenue and Essex Property Trust’s 550-unit project at 7 South Linden Avenue. — Chris Malone Méndez