Lynd Living Buys San Antonio Apartments Amid Buying Spree

As more expensive debt has turned Sun Belt multifamily markets upside down, the industry has stopped wondering whether there will be distress, and who will profit off it.

Lynd Living, a second-generation multifamily firm based in San Antonio, looks ready to jump in the ring. The firm has purchased Republic Woodlake, a 288-unit apartment complex at 7027 FM 78 in northeast San Antonio. Lynd is no stranger to the property — the firm developed it in 2007.

Since opening, the apartments have traded hands a number of times, most recently to Salt Lake City-based investor Helu Capital. Helu has acquired a number of mid-sized, value-add apartment projects in San Antonio in recent years.

Rosewood Realty Group's Daniel Shabtai — Rosewood Realty Group’s Daniel Shabtai (Rosewood Realty Group)

Some 15 years later, Lynd has returned to the property as it looks to pick up the pace of its multifamily acquisitions. The firm wants to close a minimum of one deal every quarter, according to Daniel Shabtai of Rosewood Realty Group, which arranged the deal.

“They’re being very aggressive,” Shabtai said. “They’re treating this the same way they treated Covid and the 2008 housing market crash. They know that if they bump their numbers up a little bit, they’ll be able to secure deals.”

Republic Woodlake also came with some secret sauce: Lynd will take on a sub-three percent, assumable HUD loan that isn’t set to mature for over 32 years. Still, negotiations over the property have been ongoing since October, as pricing for older Sun Belt multifamily assets has seen an adjustment.

The deal closed at a little over a 4 percent cap rate, which places it below the median of 5.2 percent, according to data from CoStar. The sale price wasn’t disclosed.

As brokers, buyers and sellers face a slower market, they’re getting creative to find deals, with assumable mortgages becoming a popular sweetener. They were already greasing the gears of a constrained office sales sector for some time, but now multifamily buyers are getting involved.