Robbins Electra, formed last month in the merger of Electra America and Robbins Group, has recently acquired the 296-unit Lake Ellenor apartment community from the Timbercreek Fund. The Orlando, Fla. property is Robbins Electra’s eighth North/Central Florida multifamily acquisition in the past 12 months.
Overall the Robbins Electra partnership and merger has made 36 multifamily acquisitions in the Southeast and Texas, totaling over $1 billion in acquisition value this year. As of the end of 2016, Robbins Electra has expanded its combined portfolio to 21,000 properties, with an enterprise value of over $2 billion.
For Joe Lubeck, CEO and Co-Manager of Robbins Electra, CEO of Electra America, and founder and former owner of Landmark Residential and Landmark Apartment Trust, the scale of this portfolio is nothing new. “Landmark Apartment Trust was actually my fourth major portfolio build, and what is now Robbins Electra will be our fifth,” Lubeck said. “Really how we handle the scale is that we have a fantastic platform, and all the key executives and team members who were with me at Landmark continued with me and stuck with me and knew we were going to build another platform. And once you have the right systems and the right people, it becomes very scalable.”
The Lake Ellenor property, which will be re-branded as Enclave at Lake Ellenor, is located just south of downtown Orlando and consists of one-to-three bedroom apartments in three-story buildings. Current amenities include a fitness center, business center, and two swimming pools. Robbins Electra is planning unit interior renovations, landscape upgrades, and a new summer kitchen, pool furniture, and dog park.
Lubeck’s Landmark Apartment Trust had owned, renovated, and sold Lake Ellenor six years ago, making this the second time that Lubeck has acquired and added value to the property. “It’s ready for a new update, a fresh coat of paint, and interior upgrades and the usual renovations that we bring to bear… And it’s kind of nice that we’re buying a property that we know intimately already. And we’re very excited about it,” Lubeck said.
Robbins Electra is currently focusing its acquisition efforts on the Charlotte, Raleigh, Jacksonville, Tampa, Miami, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio and Austin metros, in addition to the Orlando metro. Orlando has recently ranked #3 on the Forbes list of “The Best Cities for Jobs” in 2016, and its job opportunities have increased 4.6% within the past year. The city’s multifamily market has been an important focus point for Lubeck and Robbins Electra, which is currently targeting the fastest-growing cities in its focus markets, in terms of both job growth and population growth.
“We’ve picked pretty good targets where there’s been great quality of life, obviously great weather, and significant growth in population and employment,” said Lubeck. “And that’s really the target for us, to provide affordably priced first-class living environment for working-class people.”