BrightSpire Provides $43M Refi on Luxury Jersey City Apartment Building

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BrightSpire Capital has extended $43 million in bridge financing to Golden Glades Capital Management in order to refinance BELA Apartments, a newly built, luxury residential building in Jersey City, N.J., Commercial Observer has learned. 

The three-year, floating-rate bridge loan allowed Golden Glades to retire existing debt on the 104-unit asset and finish leasing it out. 

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JLL (JLL) Capital MarketsMatthew Pizzolato and Thomas E. Didio Jr. led a team that sourced and arranged this bridge debt on behalf of Golden Glades, according to information from JLL. 

In March 2020, around the time of the onset of the pandemic, Pizzolato and Didio had represented Golden Glades in locking in $41 million in acquisition debt to acquire the property for around $53 million; JLL had also arranged and negotiated its sale. Golden Glades had purchased it free and clear from an existing debt from a joint venture partnership among Alpine Real Estate Group, Fields Development Group and Grade Development Company.

“[Golden Glades has] done a tremendous job through lease-up since acquiring this property in the heart of COVID-19,” Pizzolato said. “BrightSpire Capital recognized this and stepped up to offer extremely attractive terms that allowed our borrower to recapitalize and lower their cost of capital.”

The eight-story asset was built in 2019, sporting a mix of one- and two-bedrooms units that average 982 square feet.

The units include full-size laundry washers, and residents have access to on-site amenities that include a fitness center, a yoga studio, grilling areas, an outdoor lounge, a club room and a rooftop with views of Jersey City, the Hudson River and Manhattan. 

The property also has about 2,600 square feet of retail space at the ground level, as well as on-site parking and bicycle storage within a garage on the first floor. 

BELA Apartments is situated in the Communipaw area of Jersey City, just a few blocks away from a host of public transit options that can take residents into greater New Jersey or New York’s five boroughs, as well as a main interstate thruway (Interstate 78) that provides direct access to Manhattan.  

The apartment building is also just steps away from Jersey City Medical Center and also Liberty State Park, which sits on the banks of the Hudson River, overlooking Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty.

Monthly rents at BELA start at $2,354 for one-bedrooms, according to the property’s website, which is currently marketing up to two months of free rent as part of a summer special. The only other available apartments listed on its website are two-bedroom, two-bathroom floor plans, with rents ranging from just under $3,200 to nearly $3,900. 

Apartments.com shows rates that range from just under $2,000 for one-bedroom layouts to around $3,800 for the larger two-bedrooms.