154-Unit Seniors Development Rising

The 154-unit Wright Senior Apartments is rising at 1000 S. Carrier Parkway on a 12.5-acre tract in Grand Prairie. The project's local co-developers are Dauley Investments, led by Dean Dauley, and attorney Hal Thorne of Thorne & Thorne Inc. Dallas-based Malone Mortgage Co. financed the development with a 40-year, fully assumable loan with a 5.37% fixed-rate interest through HUD's 221 (d)(4) Multifamily Accelerated Processing program. Baltimore-based MMA Financial LLC bought 9% of the tax credits, says Jeff Rogers, Malone's senior vice president and loan originator.

The first units in the three-building complex will deliver in January 2005 with the balance of the work set to wrap up five months later. Reserved for individuals 62 years and older, Wright Senior Apartments will have 31 units with market-rate rents and the balance ticketed as affordable housing. The monthly rent is projected to average $587 or 81 cents per sf.

"They've been working on it a couple years trying to figure out the right plan," Rogers tells GlobeSt.com. The project cleared its hurdles one or two months before the deadline expired on the affordable housing allocation, he says.

Designed by Gaylen Howard Laing of Dallas, the gated complex will include a fitness center, business center, library and a parking component with covered and surface spaces.Dallas-based Alpha-Barnes Real Estate Services will manage the complex, being built by ICI Construction Inc. of Dallas.

Units, averaging 730 sf, will range from 528 sf to 925 sf. Nineteen percent of the units will be efficiencies, 60% one-bedroom apartments and 21% two-bedroom designs.