The economy continues to appear relatively robust, though there are some signs of cooling, e.g., the 07/07 jobs report reflected a slowdown in job creation from previous months. We are also seeing rental growth in our markets start to normalize – with rent increases typically more broadly in line with CPI rather than significantly leading it, as had been the case for the last couple of years.

The broader U.S. real estate market is at a turning point after more than 12 months of rate increases from the Federal Reserve. According to research from Morgan Stanley Wealth Management, more than half of $2.9 trillion in commercial mortgages will need to be renegotiated in the next 24 months when new lending rates are likely to be up by 350 to 450 basis points.

One of Ballast Rock’s core principles is focusing on investments that have a positive social or environmental impact. For us, real estate investing is not just about cutting costs, increasing net operating income (“NOI”) and “sweating the assets.” It is about enhancing our residents’ living experience, empowering our staff to be the best they can be, and giving back to our local communities.

At Ballast Rock, we tailor the debt structure we use to each individual real estate acquisition. We base our decision on the type of debt to use based on the nature of the property, the debt markets at the time of acquisition, our business plan for a given asset, and the expected timeframe for holding the asset, along with many other factors.

We are excited to announce the sale of College Park Apartments in Macon, GA, our fourth disposition in Sunbelt Multifamily Fund I (“SB1”).

We are excited to announce the fifth acquisition of Sunbelt Multifamily Fund II – Stone Brooke and Arbordale Apartments – 139-unit and 78-unit communities located in Dalton, GA. 

Last week Simon O'Shea (Ballast Rock CIO), Ian Garcia (Ballast Rock COO & Treasurer) and I were asked to present at a US Real Estate conference in Miami for Latin American Investors. Here are some of the topics on investors' minds at the conference.

At Ballast Rock, we specialize in investing in real estate in small- to medium-sized cities across the Southeastern USA because our experience shows properties in these cities often offer better opportunities to add value (i.e. “alpha”) and increasingly more significant market rent growth potential in the current market environment.

In this educational article, we briefly discuss each of the steps involved from the moment we hear about opportunities to getting to the closing table and putting the property under management.

2020 Census data has now been released and we wanted to highlight relevant data about the continued demographic growth in the Southeast. In this article, we will review several key statistics and how they relate to the Ballast Rock Real Estate strategies.

A number of investors have inquired about our view of the effect of this new coronavirus strain on their real estate investments, workforce multifamily specifically, and real estate in general.

In this article we interview Danielle Miner (Head of In-house Property Management) and Kristy Greene (Midwest Asset Management), both senior leaders within the Watermark Partners Real Estate team that have come from different backgrounds and take distinct approaches to their roles. In our Q&A we examine their role within the company and attempt to understand some of the barriers that they face as women in a predominantly male industry.