7725 Penrose Ave. in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania — Courtesy: Kennedy Funding
By Joshua Burd
The buyer of a former Temple University campus just outside Philadelphia has secured $1.5 million in financing, in a newly announced transaction by Kennedy Funding.
The Englewood Cliffs-based lender said the borrower, 7725 Penrose LLC, is a nonprofit religious organization. It will use the loan proceeds toward its acquisition of the nine-building, 162,661-square-foot property at 7725 Penrose Ave. in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania, which is the former site of the university’s arts program.
“The former Tyler School of the Arts campus has been vacant for more than a decade, and our client will soon bring activity back to this site,” Kennedy Funding CEO Kevin Wolfer said. “This deal exemplifies the type of loans we are known for — funding great opportunities for buyers to transform vacant and distressed assets into value-providing properties for their communities.”
In a news release, Kennedy Funding noted that the former campus spans nine buildings constructed between 1920 and 2000. The complex was originally part of the estate of financier George Elkins, occupying 13.52 acres just north of Philadelphia.
The Elkins family lived on the site until 1934, at which time the property was donated to Temple University, the news release said. The Temple program now known as the Tyler School of Art and Architecture relocated to the university’s main campus in Philadelphia in 2009.
Although the property was acquired from Temple in 2017, the Elkins Park campus has been vacant ever since the school moved.
“Returning purpose to this large and historic property is significant for the Elkins Park community at large, which has seen this campus abandoned for so long,” Wolfer said.
According to Wolfer, the loan is secured by the nine buildings and an additional 41.27-acre site in Dover, New York. The firm also noted that the borrower provided a large down payment toward the property’s $3 million purchase price, allowing it to offer an 8 percent interest rate on the loan.
