Greystone expands national small loan business

Commercial real estate lending, investment and advisory company Greystone has expanded and re-focused its team dedicated to serving the small loan business. As part of the expansion, Greystone named dedicated regional market leaders and added loan originators around country, including Kyle Kalkofen in the Chicago office.

“Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae have made the financing of smaller properties via an agency execution incredibly attractive,” said Rick Wolf, head of Greystone’s small loan platform. “With increased demand for workforce housing around the country, multifamily owners are acquiring, rehabilitating and refinancing at a record pace. Having highly competitive agency loan products available as a permanent financing option is critical to the support of workforce housing and offers unparalleled flexibility and product depth.”

Since 2014, Greystone has closed over 1,400 small loans totaling over $3.64 billion, between the Freddie Mac’s small balance loan (“SBL”) program and Fannie Mae’s small loan program. The majority of these transactions are under the $5 million mark, with an overall average deal size of $2.8 million. The Agency loans include terms from five years up to 30 years, with fixed- and variable-rate options, non-recourse to the borrower, interest only and a variety of prepayment options.

“We’ve been doing small loan lending for more than 15 years and today are as deeply committed as ever to investing in the talent needed to serve borrowers in this space,” said Wolf.

Earlier in 2018, Greystone reached the milestone of providing 1,000 Freddie Mac Small Balance Loans since the program’s inception in October 2014. In addition to closing the first loan on the platform, in 2017 Greystone also was the first lender to close $1 billion in Freddie Mac Small Balance Loans in a calendar year.

Kalkofen previously held positions at MetLife Real Estate, Silver Leaf Commercial Mortgage and Berkadia Commercial Mortgage. He holds a master of science in real estate from DePaul University’s Charles H. Kellstadt Graduate School of Business and a bachelor of science in finance and insurance from Illinois State University.