Lendlease JV Lines Up $450M for Brooklyn Towers
This is the state’s largest geothermal-powered residential property.
Lendlease and Aware Super have obtained a $450 million refinancing loan for The Riverie, an 834-unit luxury development in Brooklyn, N.Y., as first reported by Commercial Observer. Ares Management issued the loan in a deal arranged by CBRE.
This debt retires a previous $360 million construction note that Bank of America, Mizuho Bank, Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp. and TD Bank had originated in 2022.
Construction kicked off in 2023 and the project topped out one year later. And last month, the first residents moved in at The Riverie, which became the largest geothermal residential property in the state of New York. The community targets LEED Gold certification.
The developers benefited from exemptions in tax increases during construction, and will continue to do so for another 10 to 25 years, in accordance with the Affordable Housing New York Program. In exchange, 30 percent of units are set aside as income-restricted.
The Riverie encompasses two towers rising 37 and 20 stories atop a six-level podium. Floorplans comprise studio and one- to three-bedroom layouts ranging from 405 to 1,468 square feet.
The property includes more than 130,000 square feet of amenity space, featuring coworking suites, a gym, a sauna, music and podcast studios, as well as a rooftop swimming pool, among others. The Riverie also includes 13,000 square feet of retail space and an 18,000-square-foot waterfront park.
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Located at 18 India St., also known as 1 Java St., the towers are on the East River bank, about 3 miles north of Williamsburg Bridge and 2 miles south of the Queens-Midtown Tunnel.
The Riverie is one of the last multifamily properties Lendlease owns in the country, according to Commercial Observer. In 2024, the firm announced its U.S. exit, selling its operations, which at the time included roughly 45 projects across New York and New Jersey, to Consigli Building Group.
CBRE Vice Chairmen Tom Traynor and Tom Rugg, together with Director Peter Griesinger, as well as Associate Vice President Arman Samouk, negotiated the debt placement on behalf of the owners.
Multifamily loan origination registers a multi-quarter high
Multifamily debt origination went up 36 percent year-over-year in 2025, according to the latest MBA origination index survey. This increase followed a 27 percent growth in 2024. Additionally, loan issuance in the last three months of 2025 topped all other such intervals dating back at least 16 quarters.
And this momentum is poised to carry on in 2026, according to several experts at the Mortgage Bankers Association’s 2026 Commercial Real Estate Finance Conference in San Diego.
