Merritt on the River

Transaction Overview
Property Type: Office and multi-family
Transaction: Property acquisition / development / disposition

Transaction Background
Merritt on the River, an 8.6-acre site located in Norwalk, CT, included two vacant office buildings formerly occupied as the corporate headquarters of Caldor, a bankrupt east coast retailer.

Transaction Summary
CBA, through its affiliate, Cheslock Bakker Opportunity Fund, L.P. (CBOF), created a joint venture with a local, Connecticut based firm with extensive experience in rehabilitation and development, to acquire the Caldor lease in bankruptcy proceedings, and contributed the lease rights to a new partnership formed with Fairfield Investors, which contributed the ownership rights to the property.

The property was fully renovated and subsequently leased for multi-tenant office use. Furthermore, the joint venture completed a 227 unit apartment building in 2000 atop a parking structure built to service both the office and multi-family buildings. The project was a tremendous success, with the multi-family building sold to a major institutional investor in 2002 at a "record breaking transfer price per unit." The total sale price represented a significant return on the initial investment. The office buildings were sold in 2004.