LOS ANGELES—Another multifamily investor sweeps up an apartment complex in the up-and-coming neighborhood of Koreatown. Roxbury Ventures LLC has sold First Street, a six-story, 55-unit building at 3715 West First Street in Koreatown for $7 million, or $174 per square foot, with a 5.46% cap rate. The name of the buyer was undisclosed.

Roxbury Ventures purchased the property 14 months ago after it completed the Rent Escrow Account Program. After purchasing the property, it invested another $650,000 in improvements to “bring the property back to life,” according to Kamyar Shabani, a principal at Roxbury Ventures. “We had achieved all of our goals in about a year and we knew that the market is currently very responsive to renovated Koreatown brickers,” Shabani tells GlobeSt.com. The renovations included updating approximately 36% of the interior units with new kitchens, which include quartz countertops and glass tile backsplash, hardwood laminate floors and walk-in closets. The property was originally built in 1927, and has a mix of studio and one-bedroom apartments.

Because this is such a sought-after market, Shabani received multiple offers for the property. “The final buyer purchased the property without re-trading us because they were aware of the competition for our product,” says Shabani. In the end, Roxbury Ventures got a 70% return on their initial investment. The investor plans to use the proceeds from the sale to reinvest in other Koreatown multifamily properties. Janet Neman, senior managing director at Charles Dunn, represented the buyer and the seller in the transaction.

This sale comes at the tale end of a great year for the Koreatown market with high interest from investors. It really made headlines when a joint venture between TruAmerica Multifamily and Capri Capital Partners purchased the Vermont, Koreatown's first luxury multifamily property, for $283 million from JH Snyder. The sale was one of the largest multifamily sales of the year in the Koreatown market.

Instant Insights /

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