Bidders score condos for half off

Editor's note: Republished with permission from TheRealDeal.com. Click here to view original article.

By C.J. HUGHES

On Sept. 21, Lofts 881, a new condominium located in downtown Bridgeport, Conn., auctioned off 13 of 19 unsold apartments in the building, which has 38 total residential units.

The hour-long auction, which is believed to be the first of its kind in the state, took place in a conference room in a Marriott Hotel in the town of Trumbull, Conn., amid candy bowls and a two-piece jazz band.

The 60 people there bid on one- and two-bedroom units that range in size from 540 square feet to 1,452 square feet, with granite counters, bamboo floors and stainless-steel appliances. The red-brick, five-story Lofts 881, which is named for its address on Lafayette Boulevard, features a 1,000-square-foot basement gym and a 2,000-square-foot roof deck in a building that formerly contained doctor's offices.

Winning bidders likely went home happy. Their bids, between $125,000 and $190,000, were up to 50 percent lower than what buyers paid for units in the building two years ago, when they first hit the market.

A typical two-bedroom sold for $300,000 in 2007 but just $150,000 on Sunday, said Jason Epstein, a principal with E/N Properties of White Plains, N.Y., the developer. In fact, Epstein pulled the last six units off the auction block because the prices were starting to come in way too low; they will be marketed, although not exclusively, in the next few weeks to the losing bidders on Sunday, he explained.

Epstein said he was disappointed by yesterday's bids. It's been a struggle to keep up with the $8 million project's carrying costs of $50,000 a month, he said, and on a preliminary crunching Sunday's numbers don't provide much relief.

"We need to hit much higher numbers to have breathing room," he said. "There's not a great deal of upside."

Epstein, though, can reject most of the bids but four that were guaranteed to sell if the minimum was met, and has until Friday to do so after consulting with his lenders, which are Community Preservation Corp. and the New Boston Fund.

While half-off discounts may be tough to swallow, prices in Bridgeport -- a former industrial powerhouse that's labored to reinvent itself in the past few years -- are down by as much as 30 percent since the market's peak, said Paul Yasutake, a broker with Park Avenue Realty. ...CONTINUED

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