Fastest-Growing Life Sciences Hub
Commercial Observer
Connecting and informing industry leaders of trends and individuals defining the global commercial real estate landscape
The Boston suburb of Watertown has added more square feet of life sciences real estate in the last few years relative to its size than any other place in the United States. How’d that happen, and how’d it change the city of 36,000? Come along. Also for today: a $525 million commercial mortgage-backed securities loan for a multifamily portfolio.
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— Tom Acitelli, Deputy Editor
Biotech-Ville U.S.A.: The Story Behind America's Fastest-Growing Life Sciences Hub
One morning in May of this year, the principal behind two life sciences companies parked his car in front of a six-story building in the final throes of construction a little ways inside the border of Watertown, Mass. Jonathan Davis, founder and CEO of Boston-based developer the Davis Companies, awaited him. The meeting was the culmination of a personal networking effort on Davis’s part to draw tenants for the 224,000-square-foot building at 66 Galen Street at a time of a dramatic slowdown in life sciences leasing. Davis’s visitor got out of his car. “You know, I just got here in eight minutes from the South End,” he said. The South End is one of Boston’s central neighborhoods. Getting from it to most places in the metropolitan region of roughly 4.9 million souls can sap a driver’s faith in humanity.
Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs Refi Multifamily Portfolio With $525M CMBS Loan
Global investment firm Iconiq Capital has secured $525 million of commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) debt to refinance a six-asset multifamily portfolio spread out across the U.S. according to Bloomberg data. Deutsche Bank and Goldman Sachs originated the five-year, fixed-rate, interest-only loan on the 1,790-unit portfolio, which spans 1.9 million square feet over five states. The loan will be securitized in the ICNQ 2024-MF CMBS deal, has a 64.7 percent loan-to-value ratio and is collateralized by rental apartment properties under the Sentral umbrella in Florida, Texas, Tennessee, Illinois and Colorado. Newmark arranged the transaction with a team led by Jonathan Firestone and Jordan Roeschlaub in collaboration with Blake Thompson, Bill Fishel and Nick Scribani, sources said.
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