Preferred Apartment Communities Buys Houston Retail Center from Hines REIT

Preferred Apartment Communities Inc. (NYSE: APTS), a publicly traded REIT and sponsor of alternative investments, purchased Champions Village, a 403,523-square-foot shopping center in northwest Houston, from Hines Real Estate Investment Trust.

Champions Village, which is anchored by Randall’s grocery chain, is the final closing to complete the acquisition of a portfolio of eight grocery anchored centers purchased from Hines. As reported by The DI Wire, the other seven centers closed in August and are strategically located throughout Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, and Texas.

Preferred Apartment Communities purchased the asset through its wholly-owned subsidiary New Market Properties LLC.

“This purchase of Champions Village completes the closing on the entire Hines retail portfolio. We believe the tenants of Champions Village with their strong historical sales performance will continue to benefit from the surrounding dense 3-mile population of over 100,000 people and the affluent households with average incomes over $90,000,” said Joel Murphy, president and chief executive officer of New Market.

The company financed the acquisition with a non-recourse 5-year floating rate loan at 3 percent over the 30-day LIBOR Rate from Metropolitan Life Insurance Company.

Preferred Apartment Communities was launched as a non-traded REIT in 2010 and began trading on the New York Stock Exchange the following year. The company currently owns a retail portfolio of 31 grocery anchored centers across seven Sunbelt states. PAC recently began offering 2 million shares of non-traded redeemable preferred stock for $1,000 per share with a 6 percent yield. The preferred share also includes one warrant to purchase 20 shares of the company’s common stock. On Wednesday, shares of APTS common stock closed at $12.48.

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