Northeast-side apartment complex fetches $30.2 million

A large apartment complex on the northeast side of Indianapolis has been purchased for $30.2 million, with the new owner planning $4.7 million in improvements to the property.

Nashville, Tennessee-based Covenant Capital Group LLC announced Tuesday that it has acquired Columns of Castleton, a 398-unit complex at 7615 Ivywood Drive, near the interchange of interstates 465 and 69. The sale closed Monday.

Columns of Castleton was built in two phases, in 1969 and 1974, and had been owned since 1988 by the New Jersey-based Samuel Geltman Co.

The $4.7 million in upgrades planned by Covenant Capital include renovating unit interiors, as well as installing energy-efficient appliances, low-flow kitchen and bathroom fixtures, and LED lighting throughout the property.

Covenant Capital was founded in 2001. It has more than $1 billion in assets under management and controls 9,250 apartment units.

The sale of Columns of Castleton marks the third north-side apartment complex to sell in the past four months.

Atlanta-based Radco Cos. in April sold the 455-unit Ashford at Keystone to an affiliate of Los-Angeles-based Summit Equity Investments Inc. Summit paid $36 million for the property along the east side of Keystone Avenue, north of East 65th Street, and has renamed the complex Summit at Keystone.

And in June, Lake Castleton Apartments, a 1,261-unit complex situated on nearly 90 acres at Shadeland Avenue and 75th Street, sold for $90.6 million—an amount believed to be a record for an apartment sale in Indiana.

The apartment community was acquired by a joint venture of Mishawaka-based Sterling Group and Austin, Texas-based Virtus Real Estate LLC.

The complex was sold by an affiliate of Los Angeles-based Mount Auburn Capital LP, which acquired the property for just $39 million in late 2009 from Denver-based Apartment Investment & Management Co., better known as AIMCO.