CEI expands in Florida, hires veteran local developers
This marks the firm’s third expansion since Oct. 2021 when they entered into a joint venture partnership with Winter Properties
This post was written by Tannistha Sinha and published on 9/1/2022 on FinLedger.com
Cypress Equity Investments (CEI), a multifamily developer and real estate investment company, is establishing its presence in Florida with new offices in St. Petersburg and Ft. Lauderdale, according to a press release. Michael Sorochinsky, CEI’s founder and CEO, made the announcement.
While the St. Petersburg office address was finalized, the Ft. Lauderdale office location is yet to be announced.
This marks the firm’s third expansion since Oct. 2021 when they entered into a joint venture partnership with Winter Properties, a real estate investment, management and development company. CEI opened an office in Dallas in March 2022 and Denver in December 2021.
CEI also underwent a local leadership recruitment process, hiring Errol Blumer as its senior vice president of acquisitions and Wesley Geys as the senior vice president of development to keep a lookout for “garden, mid-rise, and high-rise off-market multifamily opportunities” in Florida, the release states.
Sorochinsky explained in the release that the Florida expansion is a part of its strategy to establish its presence in the U.S. The company will also appoint local leaders for supervision, he added.
“In Errol and Wes, we are confident we have secured regional experts who share our commitment and passion for working with community leaders to build and own multifamily communities with integrity, honesty, and a dedication to quality” he said in the statement.
CEI’s new leadership are multifamily veterans. Blumer, who will be based in Ft. Lauderdale, has more than a decade of local market experience. He has developed more than 12,000 multifamily units in the Southeast worth approx. $2 billion and previously founded the South Florida multifamily investment sales office for Northmarq.
Geys will leverage more than two decades of experience to lead CEI’s St. Petersburg office. He has developed of 6,400 multifamily units valued at $1.8 billion. Before CEI, Geys held leadership positions at Jefferson Apartment Group, Tavistock Development Company, Greystone andLandmark Companies.
CEI has offices in Los Angeles, Dallas and Boston, among other cities, with 9,004 completed apartment residences in its portfolio, with plans to develop 11,000 more in the future.
Recently, CEI broke ground on venue G, a 354-unit residential apartment complex in Bayonne, New Jersey. The project is located adjacent to CEI’s 180-unit residential Edge apartment community, which was recently completed in partnership with Winter Properties.
In other recent proptech news, FinLedger spoke with Joe Fitzgerald, senior vice president of lease market strategy at Visual Lease, to discuss its report on common lease accounting challenges and the implications of the new lease accounting standards. Bellwether Enterprise Real Estate Capital LLC (BWE), the national, commercial and multifamily mortgage banking company, also closed a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development 221(d)(4) loan of $74 million.