S3 Capital, a national private construction lender, announced it has provided a $45 million leasehold construction loan for the development of 277 North 8th Street, a 17-story, 99-unit residential building with ground-floor retail in the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn, N.Y. Twenty percent of the units will be designated as affordable housing under New York City’s 485-x tax incentive program.
The development sits on land controlled through a long-term ground lease with the Roman Catholic Church of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.
Financing a ground-up development on leasehold land, rather than a fee-owned site, called for a different approach than a conventional construction loan. S3 structured the loan around the leasehold interest and the terms of the ground lease, allowing the sponsor to advance construction without the capital commitment typically required to acquire the underlying land outright.
The project is being developed by GW Infinity, a New York Cit
