Midwest

The Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul continue to be a very attractive marketplace for multifamily investing due to an average vacancy across the metro of 3.1 percent, as well as average 2019 rent growth of 5.8 percent, according to a recent report issued by Marquette Advisors. The Twin Cities currently has nearly 30,000 multifamily units in the development pipeline that are expected to be delivered between 2020 and 2022. With all of this development activity and an abundance of local and regional banks in the area, the Twin Cities continues to be a very well-banked market, particularly with regard to apartment construction. Local and regional banks are all very active. In addition, national banks are eager to invest in the healthy, consistent Twin Cities multifamily market. But despite capital being relatively plentiful and accessible, local, regional and national developers are exploring more efficient ways to capitalize on the abundance of development activity. They also pursue ways to stretch their own equity through a variety of financing alternatives. Developers may be tapped out with their current banking relationships, or as projects get larger and more expensive, desired loan sizes may drift higher than their banks’ lending limits. Lenders and …