Sentinel Real Estate Buys Northern Delaware Apartments

By Dees Stribling, Contributing Editor

Newark, Del.—The Apartments at Pike Creek, a 264-unit garden-style complex on 19 acres in Newark, Del., has changed hands for an undisclosed price. The seller was Henderson Global, while the buyer was a fund managed by Sentinel Real Estate Corp.

Pike Creek’s 11 three- and four-story buildings include 154 one-bedroom and 110 two-bedroom units. The property features a swimming pool, tennis court, fitness center with sauna, a wifi-enabled clubhouse and a car care center. Its location in suburban Wilmington, Del., is between Philadelphia and Baltimore, though a little closer to the former.

Karen Iman, Brian Whitmer, Andrew Merin, and Anthony Liberto of Cushman & Wakefield’s Capital Markets Group represented the seller and procured the buyer. According to Iman, the deal offered a “rare opportunity to acquire an institutional-grade apartment community in the affluent Pike Creek area.”

Iman added that about 70 percent of the market’s inventory was built before 1979, while Pike Creek was completed in 1988. Newer product is quite rare in the area, even though demand is strong; Pike Creek was near full occupancy at the time of sale.

As an investor, Sentinel Real Estate has properties in all regions of the United States, a vast majority of which (nearly 90 percent) are apartments. The company currently manages pooled and separate accounts holding diversified portfolios of properties valued at about $4.5 billion.