Mt. Vernon Co. Makes 197-Unit Apt. Buy

(Read more on the multifamily market.)

EAST PROVIDENCE, RI-A pair of apartment assets here has been sold to the Mount Vernon Co., a Boston-based real estate investment and management firm active in both multifamily and commercial properties. Totaling 197 units, Eastgate On the Trail and Eastshore sold for a total consideration of $14.8 million, or about $75,000 per apartment.

“Given their outstanding locations and value-added potential, Eastgate and Eastshore will enjoy success long into the future,” says Cushman & Wakefield editorial director Simon Butler, a member of the C&W Capital Markets Group that brokered the sale on behalf of Deeble Holdings and East Shore LP. Both apartment communities offer quick access to downtown Providence, generating demand from the workforce in that now-bustling business district. The Rhode Island apartment market also continues to strengthen, further enhancing the prospects going forward, says Butler, who negotiated the sale with C&W colleagues Robert Griffin Jr. and Biria St. John.

The larger of the two properties is Eastgate, a 107-unit complex sited on a 4.6-acre parcel just off the Wampanoag Trail. Eastgate consists of a single-story community recreation building and a pair of three-story residential buildings. The structures feature concrete foundations and a combination of brick veneer and wood siding exteriors. The buildings have a mix of studios and one- and two-bedroom units with an average size of 854 sf. Eastgate amenities include laundry facilities, an outdoor swimming pool and resident storage space.

Eastshore is on a 4.1-acre parcel off Boyd Ave. and consists of four buildings. One is a single-story asset utilized as the development’s leasing center, while the remainder are three-story apartment buildings similar in design to those at Eastgate. The average unit size is slightly smaller at 851 sf, but the complex has amenities similar to Eastgate.

Efforts to contact Mount Vernon Co. chairman Bruce Percelay to discuss the firm’s latest investment were unsuccessful by press deadline. Butler says he anticipates the buyers will undertake a capital improvements program at Eastgate and Eastshore and praises Mount Vernon Co. for its demonstrated ability to reposition older developments. Initially focused on Boston’s tony Back Bay and Beacon Hill neighborhoods when it was founded in 1985, Mount Vernon Co. now has apartments throughout the city in districts such as Allston and Brighton, as well as in Nantucket, Newton and Quincy. Commercial assets are concentrated in metropolitan Boston, but the firm also has holdings in Providence and southern Florida.