Bascom refis 133-unit Charleston Apartments with $8.5M bank loan

The refinancing wall is being dismantled one small-balance bank loan at a time. The Charleston Apartments at 729 S Union Ave, built in 1924 as a fashionable residence on the edge of downtown Los Angeles and now a 133-unit pocket of affordable housing in the Westlake/MacArthur Park district, has just completed an $8.5 million refinancing by the Bascom Group.

Marcus & Millichap Capital Corporation arranged the loan, with Michael Derk, Daizy Gomez, Linsey Farrahi and Zack Metzner placing it for Bascom; CalPrivate Bank provided the financing through SVP and senior relationship manager Anthony Lopo. Ingenious Asset Group, a Los Angeles property management firm, oversees the building.

The dollar figure is modest, but the trade is a useful test because the refinancing-wall story tends to center on giant loans and headline distress, while in practice the wall is a long tail of small legacy buildings whose refinancings happen quietly. The resolution was a local bank stepping in on a century-old affordable asset that underwrites on current income rather than exit appreciation.

That suggests the cast of lenders willing to touch this segment is broadening, and it cuts in favor of the view this publication has argued: relationship capital, not distress auctions, is doing the clearing. CalPrivate's willingness to lend against the Charleston indicates that small-balance multifamily still has a bid, as long as the lender can price the actual cash flow of an old rent roll.