Foreclosed Berkeley Building Changes Hands
Read Investment purchased the property.
Read Investments has acquired Higby, a 98-unit community in Berkeley, Calif., for $32 million, SilliconValley reported. Ullico previously owned the asset, Yardi Matrix shows.
The insurance company gained control of the property in August 2024, after The Green Cities Co. provided a deed in lieu of foreclosure on a debt of $34.5 million held by Ullico, the data provider reveals.
That loan was part of a recapitalization of $51.5 million which added New Island Capital to the ownership group in 2019, according to the same source.
Located at 3015 San Pablo Ave., the community is some 10 miles northeast of downtown San Francisco, while the 42,500-square-foot Berkeley Bowl Market Place is less than 2 miles away.
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The five-story community came online in 2015 and features one- to three-bedroom floorplans ranging between 503 and 1,416 square feet, as well as about 10,000 square feet of ground-floor retail space. Seven of the units are affordable.
Amenities comprise a rooftop deck with barbecues and firepits, a gym, a courtyard and a bocce ball court, as well as a gym and EV charging stations, among others.
Debt, delinquencies and investment on the rise
The level of commercial/multifamily mortgage debt outstanding increased by $47.7 billion in 2024’s third quarter, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s latest report. However, delinquencies rose across the board for every major capital source as well, according to MBA’s Head of Commercial Real Estate Research Jamie Woodwell.
Troubled debt isn’t new to Greater San Francisco. The tail end of 2023 witnessed what was then the largest portfolio deal in more than a decade when Brookfield foreclosed on Veritas’ 2,150-unit collection, purchasing it for $464 million. Veritas’ loans on the properties had been valued at $900 million before it went into default.
In lockstep with delinquencies, investment also increased in the metro. Greater San Francisco’s multifamily transaction volume spiked by 33.7 percent year-over-year, clocking in at more than $3.3 billion in 2024, according to Yardi Matrix data.
