Colliers International’s structured finance team of Jeffrey Donnelly and Ulrike Ahrens has been retained as exclusive advisor by Austin, Texas-based developer Legend Communities to source $217 million in debt and equity for the construction of One Two East.
The project is a two-tower, 474-unit, market rate multi-family and active senior living residential development in Austin, Texas.
Austin has been one of the top two fastest growing cities in the United States for the past several years, and has grown by more than 50 percent since 2000.
The multi-family project is located in the Downtown/East Austin submarket, less than one mile from the University of Texas campus. It is across the street from the 244-bed Brackenridge Hospital, and less than half a mile from the under-construction, $295 million, 211-bed Dell Seton Medical Center, as well as the University of Texas at Austin Dell Medical School, also under construction.
The One Two East project sponsor, Legend Communities, is led by principals Haythem Dawlett and John Scardino.
Legend Communities has executed a wide range of large scale residential and commercial developments throughout Texas and California over the last 20 plus years.
“This client is a creative and dynamic visionary who has patiently assembled this large site,” said Donnelly, an executive director with Colliers International. “Legend has designed an exceptional, diverse product.”
Donnelly expects the financing to be finalized by the second quarter of 2016. “While we expect to have agency construction loan options for this project, we are certain that the offering will also be enthusiastically embraced by bank balance sheet lenders and insurance company lenders,” he said.
“I think the debt falls into place fairly quickly — although due to size of the construction loan, it may entail a syndication of bank lenders. We’re equally confident that the equity investment opportunity will be very attractive to large institutional investors eager to deploy capital in fast-growing Austin.”
