Venterra Realty, Dome Equities buy St. Petersburg's Calais Park

BUYER: V.R. Calais Park Holdings LP, Richmond Hill, Ontario
SELLER: St. Pete Apartments Ltd.
PROPERTY: 5700 22nd St. N. (5800 Calais Lane), St. Petersburg
PRICE: $29.73 million
PREVIOUS PRICE: $1.69 million, October 2000
LAW FIRM ON DEED: Locke Lord LLP, Dallas

PLANS, DESCRIPTION: Joint-venture partners Venterra Realty Inc. and Dome Equities LLC purchased the 261-unit Calais Park apartments for $29.73 million.

The price equated to $113,889 per unit.

The 10-year-old St. Petersburg community occupies a more than 22-acre gated parcel half a mile east of Interstate 275. With four buildings Calais Park features one-, two- and three-bedroom units averaging 1,215 square feet each. Community amenities include a fitness center, laundry facilities, heated swimming pool and Jacuzzi spa and attached and detached garages.

Calais Park is 96.7% occupied.

Cortney Cole, director of HFF (Holliday Fenoglio Fowler LP), arranged financing for the Calais Park purchase. The $22.29 million, seven-year loan, secured through GE Capital Real Estate, was for a 3.7% interest rate and two years of interest-only payments.

Venterra Realty, which has offices in Houston and Toronto, buys and manages multifamily residential communities in the southern United States. It currently manages a portfolio of multifamily real estate assets valued at more than $1 billion and generating gross annual income of more than $90 million.

Dome Equities LLC is a New York City-based private-equity real estate investment firm. It currently oversees a portfolio valued at more than $747 million across 43 assets in 20 metropolitan areas. Its portfolio contains primarily apartment but also features retail, office and to an even smaller extent hotels, self-storage facilities and mobile home parks.