Wood Partners says it expects to lead the nation in multifamily development starts in 2010, with more than 2,000 units and US$400M worth of development

Cindy Allen

ATLANTA , January 13, 2011 (press release) – During a year that was challenging on every real estate front, Wood Partners mounted an aggressive offensive in 2010 that has firmly established the company as an industry leader in both multifamily development and acquisition.

Wood Partners' exceptional year was capped by a late-December joint venture with a co-investment fund sponsored by global real estate investment management firm CB Richard Ellis Investors (CBREI).

The joint venture was established for a series of identified development projects nationwide. The $155 million of equity will be used to develop and construct $400 million of Class A, for-rent multifamily communities across the country. Approximately $300 million has been allocated to deals that started in 2010, with the balance to be allocated in the first quarter of 2011.

"We are pleased to enter into this strategically significant, programmatic equity joint venture at this critical early stage of the emerging real estate cycle," said Wood Partners CEO Ryan Dearborn. "This fund is fully allocated to an economically compelling and geographically diverse set of development projects. We are very proud to be aligned with our long-time partner CBREI. They are first-class partners who bring a lot more than capital to the table."

Wood Partners is expected to lead the nation in multifamily development starts in 2010 with over 2,000 units and $400 million worth of development coming out of the ground. New apartment community starts are dispersed across the country with projects now under construction in Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Charlotte, Dallas, Denver, the District of Columbia, Oakland and San Diego.

"Wood Partners has deep, long-standing relationships with a number of institutional equity investors and we believe this will enable us to double our productivity in 2011 by starting at least 4,000 additional units," Dearborn said.

Just six months after assembling its new acquisition team, Wood Partners has also established itself as one of the nation's top acquirers of existing multifamily communities. The company acquired more than 3200 units in 2010 representing a total capital investment of more than $400 million. Assets were acquired in Dallas, Houston, Jacksonville, Miami, Oakland and San Antonio. Building on the momentum of a portfolio acquisition of nine properties in Texas in late December, Wood Partners expects to surpass this acquisition volume in 2011.

"Expanding our lines of business to include acquisition gave us a tremendous advantage in 2010," said Wood Partners CFO and COO Joe Keough. "We will continue to identify above-average return opportunities within the acquisition space in 2011 and believe we have the right team in place to further grow this business."

To send a strong message of its commitment to workforce housing and green building, the company expanded its Specialty Housing Group (SHG) with representatives in each of its five regions nationwide. Wood Partners also instituted a new energy policy in 2009 requiring new developments going forward to be designed and constructed to, at a minimum, achieve the ENERGY STAR® standard.

Wood Partners also took advantage of a robust sales market and a very favorable permanent debt-financing market to dramatically deleverage its balance sheet.

"The past few years have been seminal ones for our industry; many of our competitors have gone bankrupt, significantly restructured or are still struggling to turn the corner," Keough said. "We have come out of this more quickly than most. With our established and productive acquisition team, the best and largest development pipeline in the country and a healthy balance sheet, Wood Partners enters 2011 with extremely strong momentum."

About Wood Partners
Wood Partners is a national real estate company that acquires, develops, constructs and property manages high density and mixed-use communities. The company has been involved in the development of more than 36,000 homes with a combined value of more than $4.5 billion nationwide. The company operates 15 offices across the country in Atlanta, Baltimore, Boca Raton, Boston, Charlotte, Dallas, Denver, Houston, Newport Beach, Orlando, Phoenix, Raleigh-Durham, San Francisco, Seattle and Washington D.C. To learn more, please visit our newly redesigned website at www.woodpartners.com.

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