Our Business
Our mission at The England Group is to acquire and professionally manage high-quality multi-family real estate projects in order to maximize cash flow and long term appreciation for our investors, while preserving their capital.
Real estate investments offer a hedge against inflation and have always been an important component of a diversified investment portfolio. While there are many different sectors in the real estate market - from office and industrial to retail and land - our focus has been primarily in the multi-family sector. Income-producing multi-family investments such as apartments, condominiums and townhouses offer a good balance between risk and reward, providing investors with a stream of income, tax benefits, and the opportunity for long-term capital appreciation.
Our philosophy is to acquire strategically located buildings of superior quality and architectural merit, and then support them with responsive, professional management. In turn, our assets attract better tenants, command higher rents, and retain their value despite the ups and downs of the real estate market.
We attribute a large part of our success to our ability to consistently acquire and sell properties at optimal prices. The executive team is always looking for new and innovative ways to reposition the properties and drive out the highest property values to ensure the greatest possible value and return from our properties. We assume responsibility for all aspects of property management - we oversee every function from acquisition to disposition, provide investors with quarterly financial reporting, and employ some of the most effective maintenance and tenant retention initiatives in the industry.
Prior to investigating any specific property, we concentrate our due diligence efforts on regional site selection. We focus on a handful of regional markets across North America that offer superior economic and employment growth. This, in turn, leads to greater income and capital appreciation for the properties we acquire.
Once a specific region is identified, we work closely with our network of real estate professionals, property managers and investment advisors to hand-pick a project, often purchasing at discount prices in distress situations. Our mandate is to provide our investors with a strategically-located residential project that will generate competitive quarterly cash returns plus long-term growth in the property's value.
Maximizing Income and Creating Long-Term Value
In order to effectively manage the day-to-day operations of the properties, we select professional, third-party property management companies that have expertise in the local markets.
We have worked closely with property managers for a number of years, and have established bonus programs to align our objectives and motivate them to manage like business owners. Property managers take a collaborative approach, sharing ideas and marketing initiatives that improve the quality of our projects and keep our occupancy levels high. Our agenda is to have our managers treat residents as guests rather than tenants.
Once we acquire a new project, our team will immediately look to aggressively manage and creatively reposition a new property to achieve increased occupancy and rental rates. For example, capital improvement projects and marketing initiatives such as tenant retention programs, new amenity installations and landscaping upgrades are frequently undertaken in order to enhance both cash flow and asset value.
Throughout this process, we focus on 'managing the managers'. Our asset managers provide direct supervision and guidance on a daily basis to ensure that each property is operated in the most efficient manner, and that residents are treated as guests, rather than tenants.
Over the course of our 26 year history we have selectively sold a number of investment properties, realizing substantial gains for our investors.
The determination to exit an investment is made on an individual property and regional market basis. We constantly monitor economic indicators and area demographics and adjust our focus by exiting markets that have reached maturity and investing in other emerging regions. There are a number of factors that impact our recommendation to sell, including the amount of new development occurring throughout the community, future improvements planned for the local transportation infrastructure, and even the activity level of condominium converters in the immediate area.
Refinancing Strategy
The England Group continues to focus on the acquisition, disposition and management of high quality multi-family residential real estate assets in select U.S. and Canadian markets. Our objective is always to maximize cash-flow and asset appreciation, while preserving capital. Optimizing the financial structure of each project - including favourable mortgage rates and terms to maximize equity returns – is an important part of our business. The current low interest rate environment has allowed us to refinance existing maturing mortgages at well below the maturing rates. In most cases, we have been able to effectively use the appreciation profit that is available and distribute a return to our investors. This strategy allows our investors to utilize the deferred tax liability that would otherwise be triggered on disposition, and continue to own an appreciating asset.
In addition, because TEG focuses on quality multi-family residential real estate, we are eligible to obtain government insured mortgages through various programs such as HUD, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in the U.S., and CMHC in Canada. These mortgages often qualify for lower interest rates which result in lower debt-servicing costs and higher yields for investors.
2013 Refinancings
Abbey at Vista Ridge – September 2013
Loan Amount: $23.1 million
Total project refinancing distributions to date: $5.3 million
Huntington Glen – July 2013
Loan Amount: $7.9 million
Total project refinancing distributions to date: $2.4 million
2012 Refinancings
Fieldcrest – October 2012
Loan Amount: $9.8 million
Total project refinancing distributions to date: $3.9 million
Tallows – October 2012
Loan Amount: $13.3 million
Total project refinancing distributions to date: $3.8 million
Carrington Park – September 2012
Loan Amount: $27.5 million
Total project refinancing distributions to date: $3.1 million
Arbor Valley – July 2012
Loan Amount: $10.7 million
Total project refinancing distributions to date: $4.3 million
Tall Timbers – July 2012
Loan Amount: $10.1 million
Total project refinancing distributions to date: $4.0 million