Gebroe-Hammer Handles More Than $55M in MF Trades in 5 Weeks

LIVINGSTON, NJ-The sale of four small apartment buildings in Jamesburg this week capped a furious five weeks of multifamily trades in northern and central New Jersey orchestrated by Gebroe-Hammer Associates.

The Livingston-based brokerage company closed one or two deals a week – and sometimes three – in each week of March and the first week of April, G-H managing director Ken Uranowitz tells GlobeSt.com. In March alone, it handled $55.15 million in trades, involving a total of 874 units, Uranowitz says.

In early April, G-H executive vice-president Joseph Brecher arranged the $2.66 million sale of 39 total units in the Jamesburg buildings, located just off the New Jersey Turnpike Exit 8A exchange.

“In my 37 years with the company, I cannot remember having the frequency of closings we’ve had these last weeks,” Uranowitz says. “It’s very, very unusual, and it’s a beautiful time to be in the multi-family business.”

Some of the notable recent transactions include:

    * Three separate sales in Essex County that netted a combined total of $24.32 million for 460 units in Orange, East Orange and Newark. Also, G-H closed on a $1.9 million note sale for 73 units in Newark.
    * In Bergen County, the $1.6 million sale of 344 Gorge Rd. in Cliffside Park, where the per-unit price was $125,000.
    * Another large sale in Pennsylvania’s Clinton County, where 150 units at Lock Haven Gardens sold for $7 million

“The hotbed for multi-family trades continues to be along the Philadelphia/New Jersey/New York State corridor, where there is a high concentration of existing product,” says Uranowitz, who is the commercial brokerage firm’s multi-family investment sales specialist.

“I think multi-family transaction velocity will continue to be very hot going forward,” he adds. “We have the combined factors of a distressed housing market and a continuing lack of confirmation that the economy is really on a consistent upswing. Renting has become the new normal for many people.”

In Jamesburg, where average monthly rents are about $825 for a one-bedroom, Brecher represented the seller, Jamesburg Apartments, and found the buyer, Jamesburg Realty Partners, for the 39-unit portfolio of one-bedroom apartments. The Middlesex County properties included 6-8 Vine Street, 16 Lake Street, Eight Cherry Street and 123 Stevens Avenue, all in Jamesburg.

The apartments, three of them built in the 1990s and one in the 1970s, are close to fully occupied, Brecher tells GlobeSt. “There is some opportunity for sprucing up, raising rents, and creating some value,” he says.