MOUNT OLIVE, NJ—SDK Apartments, a privately held investor in multifamily properties, is acquiring The Village Green multifamily property and the Village Green Shopping Center, Mount Olive, NJ for $175 million.

Gebroe-Hammer Associates of Livingston, NJ, exclusively represented the seller, a private investment group, and SDK Apartments in the trade of 1,172 garden-apartment units and the adjacent 91,330-square-foot retail center.

The brokerage team of Greg Pine, executive vice president; Stephen Tragash, senior vice president; and Joseph Brecher, managing director, arranged the 76-building mixed-use sale.

"Village Green Apartments and Village Green Center are exceptional properties spanning more than 105 acres in Morris County, a major residential/retail/commercial hub," says Pine. "As part of the thriving Mount Olive/New Jersey Foreign Trade submarket, Village Green offered an extremely rare opportunity to acquire a pillar for garden-apartment home communities in Northern New Jersey. The property is known for its distinct interiors; first-class lifestyle amenities; scenic landscape; and access to major employment centers like Parsippany, Morristown and New York City."

Meridian Capital Group arranged $148.8 million in senior and mezzanine financing for the acquisition. The five-year loans, provided by a regional balance sheet lender and a mezzanine lender, feature a blended fixed-rate of 3.67 percent and interest-only payments. The transaction was negotiated by Meridian senior managing director Abe Hirsch, managing director Zev Karpel, and vice president Judah Hammer in Meridian's New York headquarters.

The Village Green and the Village Green Shopping Center are adjacent properties at 100 Route 46. The 1,172-unit multifamily community, built in 1971, features 36 laundry facilities, two pools, a golf course, four tennis courts, basketball and volleyball courts, playground/picnic area, skate park, playing fields and the onsite shopping center. The apartments were 98 percent occupied at the time of the transaction.

The Village Green Shopping Center totals 70,154 square feet of retail space and 21,176 square feet of office space. Anchored by a 30,000-square-foot Home Goods, the center has a diverse tenant roster of local, regional and national retailers, including PNC Bank and Dunkin Donuts. At the center of Mount Olive's 31 square miles is the International Trade Center, a 684-acre office/distribution/light assembly/warehouse complex that has prompted population and commercial growth within the western part of the county during the past 20 years. Numerous multi-national companies now call the township home and have attracted a well-educated workforce and professional tenant base.

"Since being built in the 1980s, Village Green has recorded historically strong occupancy rates while setting the standard for on-site amenities and nearby lifestyle services at Village Green Center," says Pine. "The buyer plans to continue a capital improvement program that includes kitchen and bath renovations implemented by the seller in order to render the community even more competitive."

The properties are conveniently situated less than two miles from the Mount Olive and Netcong NJ Transit stations, providing access to Morristown, Summit, Montclair, Newark, Hoboken and New York Penn Station.

"Meridian leveraged its relationships with the senior and mezzanine lenders to structure 85 percent loan-to-cost financing at an extremely competitive blended rate of 3.67 percent to facilitate this top-tier sponsor's acquisition," says Karpel.

SDK Apartments is a privately held, family-owned and operated real estate company that owns, manages and develops multifamily apartment complexes, specializing in value-add acquisitions in Northeastern and mid-Atlantic United States. The company now manages approximately 4,000 units, as well as several medical properties across NJ and PA.

Correction, 1/15/2016, 2:44pm: Based on information provided by Meridian Group, an earlier version of this story incorrectly described the Meridian financing as representing the total dollar amount of the transaction. The correct total is about $175 million. This version of the story also incorporates additional information and perspective from Gebroe-Hammer Associates, which handled both sides of the transaction.