Dive Brief:

• Lincoln Property Co. has acquired full-service real estate firm The Spectrum Cos., according to a press release. Since 1982, Spectrum has developed nearly 7,000 multifamily units and currently leases and manages a total of 4.4 million square feet of assets.
• Johno Harris, senior executive vice president at Lincoln, and Stephen McClure, CEO of Spectrum, will lead Lincoln’s Carolinas platform, which will also include Spectrum’s Northern and Central Florida multifamily business. Spectrum's Executive Chairman, Darryl Dewberry, will continue in his role, per the release.
• With the acquisition of the Charlotte-based company, Lincoln says the combined firm is poised to ramp up its development and acquisition pipeline across both multifamily and commercial real estate, per the release. By press time, Lincoln did not reply to multiple questions from Multifamily Dive about the deal.

Dive Insight:

Lincoln has been a major player in multifamily development and management over the years, but exited operations after selling its residential division to Cadillac Fairview in 2023, completing a process that began in 2019.

Lincoln was once the second-largest apartment manager in the country, with more than 4,500 employees and 210,086 units in 2022, according to the National Multifamily Housing Council. After the transaction, Lincoln Residential was no longer affiliated with Lincoln Property Co.’s commercial division.

With the Spectrum deal, Lincoln says it is broadening its product offerings in the Carolinas region and deepening its capacity to serve clients. However, the firm didn’t provide further details about what that meant in the release.

“By joining forces with Spectrum, we are well-positioned to grow our footprint and serve clients at a higher level across the Carolinas,” Harris said in the release.

Following the acquisition, Spectrum will continue to build on its existing customer and investor relationships while expanding its services and opportunities by incorporating Lincoln’s vertically integrated capabilities, per the release. 

Lincoln’s acquisition came on the same day as Milhaus made bigger waves, merging with SRG Residential, a subsidiary of Sares Regis Group, and acquiring Broadshore Capital Partners to expand its investment and lending capabilities.

With the deal, Milhaus created a multifamily platform with a $2.5 billion development pipeline, more than 50,000 homes managed and investing and lending capabilities across more than 20 markets nationwide.

“This is about going to 3,500 development starts a year instead of what was going to be 1,800 to 2,000,” Milhaus CEO Tadd Miller told Multifamily Dive. “This is about being at 100,000 units under management in the next 24 months. That’s what this transaction is about.”

Click here to sign up to receive multifamily and apartment news like this article in your inbox every weekday.