Investors Snag 500-unit Apartment Complex, HFF Arranges Financing

By Georgiana Mihaila, Associate Editor

The 500-unit Estancia at Ridgeview Ranch apartment complex in Plano traded hands this past week in a deal mediated by Holliday Fenoglio Fowler L.P. The buyers of the 23-building complex are The Praedium Group—a real estate investor mostly focusing on underperforming and undervalued assets—and Mike Ochstein, president of Price Realty Corp.

The Estancia at Ridgeview Ranch, completed in 2007, is located at 10200 Independence Pkwy. and is adjacent to the Ridgeview Ranch Golf Club; comprised of 23 apartment buildings with an average unit size of 1,076 square feet, the community features two pools, a car care center, a playground, a business center, a fitness center and a club room. At the time of the purchase, the apartment complex was 94 percent leased.

Working on behalf of the buyers, HFF financed the deal with MetLife Real Estate Investments. The HFF team was led by senior managing director John Brownlee and managing director Brian Carlton.

In other real estate news, Plano might also be in for a new office midrise, as Dallas developer Jesse Pruitt and Houston-based Hines plan a new office building on 11 acres of land at Plano Parkway and the Dallas North Tollway. Plans have not been finalized, but Pruitt estimates that the building could be five stories tall, spreading over 250,000 square feet; Corgan Associates Inc. is the architect; a general contractor has yet to be chosen. The developers are currently looking for tenants before construction can actually begin, but according to the Dallas Business Journal, Pruitt is confident that they will be shovel-ready by spring 2012.