By John Seelmeyer
The University of Nevada, Reno plans to buy the Ponderosa Village graduate student housing complex, paying no more than $23.8 million for the property along Evans Avenue at the northeast corner of the campus.
The school plans to borrow the money to buy the six-building complex, then repay the loan through rental revenue.
Ponderosa Village, which opened in the fall of 2014, was developed on university-owned property by a British company, Balfour Beatty plc.
As part of the original deal, the Nevada System of Higher Education has the first opportunity to buy the complex if Balfour Beatty decides to sell.
The developer now wants to sell the property by the end of this year, and the Nevada Board of Regents are expected to consider the purchase during a meeting on Nov. 29-30.
The final price has yet to be determined as negotiations continue, although UNR officials told the regents it would be no more than $23.8 million. A recent appraisal sets the value of the property at $24 million.
The complex includes 95 two-bedroom apartments and 73 one-bedroom units. All the apartments are currently occupied, and the occupancy rate hasn’t dipped below 95 percent since Ponderosa Village opened.
The Nevada System of Higher Education expects to borrow the money through a mechanism called “certificates of participation” that would be repaid over 30 years.
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John Seelmeyer is a business writer and editor in Reno. In his 40-year career, he has edited publications in Nevada, Colorado and California and written several thousand published articles about business and finance.
