Joint Venture Acquisition Announced by Greystar and Praedium

Lincoln Shores, a 631-unit apartment property in St. Petersburg, Florida, was recently acquired in a joint venture by Charleston, South Carolina-based ""Greystar Real Estate Partners"":http://www.greystar.com/Greystar/Index.aspx and ""The Praedium Group"":http://www.praediumgroup.com/, headquartered in New York.

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""We are pleased to be entering into our first joint venture with Greystar, an exceptionally experienced and dynamic organization, and we look forward to future opportunities with them,"" said David Dowell, VP at Praedium.

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Dowell said the investment was attractive because of its stabilized occupancy, excellent physical condition, and central location within the greater Tampa/St. Petersburg market. Praedium says it believes a renewed focus on management will allow it to enhance property value and remain competitive as the market recovers.

Mark Lippman, director and head of Praedium’s Southern region, said the company has had a presence in Florida since the early ‘90s and expects to see several more opportunities in 2010.

With virtually no multifamily or single-family housing supply coming online, Greystar believes the Tampa apartment market is poised for a robust recovery over the next several years, Hafner said. Lincoln Shores is the second apartment acquisition Greystar has made in Florida in the past month.

""The Tampa/St. Petersburg apartment market has been very hard hit over the past three years,"" said Mark Hafner, managing director at Greystar. ""However, we began to see the velocity of the performance decline in our portfolio decrease in the summer and have since seen same-store occupancies increase across most of the 5,000 units we manage in the Tampa/St. Petersburg market.""