European Bank Provides $20M Retail Refi Loan

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HYATTSVILLE, MD-A European bank that has been absent from the local market since the crash has reentered to refinance a retail loan on the Metropolitan Shops at Prince George’s Station. The $20-million loan is a typical bank financing with a three-year term plus options, Cassidy Turley senior managing director John Campanella tells GlobeSt.com. More significantly, he says, “it represents a return of foreign bank lending, at least for tier one sponsors.”

Cassidy Turley secured the permanent financing on behalf of an affiliate of Westbrook Partners. Besides Campanella, Paul Spellman, an associate VP at Cassidy Turley, also worked on the transaction.

The loan was perfect for a conservative-minded lender, Campanella adds. “The sponsor is world class—a well-known private equity fund—and the project is well located, on top of a Metro stop.” This particular bank, he says, had been active in the DC area before the crash.

The Metropolitan Shops at Prince George’s Station is the retail component of a master planned, transit-oriented mixed-use project totaling 160,623 square feet. Developed in 2007, it is next to the Prince George’s Plaza Metro Station.

Increasingly, sightings of foreign lenders—and buyers—are happening in the DC area market. Ironically, 2012 was supposed to be the year when interest from this group lessened in the market, according to the Association of Foreign Real Estate Investors. However, anecdotal evidence suggests otherwise.

In an earlier interview with GlobeSt.com, Al Cissel, managing director of Jones Lang LaSalle MidAtlantic Multifamily Capital Markets, said that he has noticed an increase in foreign investors seeking to stake a claim in the DC area’s multifamily market. In particular, these buyers are looking for portfolio investments because of their economies of scale.