Winnipeg group acquires second Calgary apartment block

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This article was published 26/10/2018 (2544 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Globe Capital Management is not the largest apartment building owner and manager in the country, but with its second acquisition in Calgary in the last year, its name will start to spread a little farther west.

The Winnipeg company owned by Richard Morantz now manages about 7,000 apartment suites in the three Prairie provinces, including more than 5,000 in around 70 buildings in Winnipeg. Morantz said it was not easy getting into the Calgary market, and the fact that the company has typically kept a low profile may have made it a little harder.

“We were looking at another building in Calgary that was owned by people from Toronto, but they had trouble finding out who we were (and did not sell to Globe),” Morantz said. “We’re trying to raise our profile.”

The family-owned business likes to do things quietly, but it’s still surprising that a company with scores of apartment buildings in Winnipeg, Regina, Saskatoon, Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa and Montreal would have trouble making its presence known.

Its second Calgary property, called the Granada Apartments, is a 69-suite building near the 17th Avenue corridor.

Morantz said the building is in Globe’s sweet spot — concrete, mid-to-highrise buildings that are 20 to 40 years old.

“We target properties that are, what we refer to as, under-managed,” he said.

With around 70 buildings and about 5,000 suites in Winnipeg, its hometown market is by far the most important for the company.

“It has been a good year for us,” he said. “We have managed to do a few acquisitions and vacancy rates seem to be decreasing, but we have to watch interest rates in our business.”

martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca