Spinnaker Real Estate Partners, in busiest development era yet, works to secure long-term future as CEO succession looms

Norwalk-based multifamily developer Spinnaker Real Estate Partners is in the busiest period of its four-decade history as it works to secure its long-term future. The firm, which was founded in the 1980s, has about 2,500 apartment units under construction or in the development pipeline in Connecticut, while it has completed 1,544 multifamily dwellings in the state over the past five years. Meantime, the firm continues to search for new projects in lower Fairfield County and Greater Hartford, where it already has major developments at various stages, said Clayton Fowler, Spinnaker’s founding partner, chairman and CEO. “If you don’t grow, you die,” Fowler said during a recent interview with the Hartford Business Journal at his company’s Norwalk headquarters. “We want to make Spinnaker an evergreen company. We have a lot of young people that want to grow and make money, so we gotta grow to … beat their aspirations.” Fowler, who will turn 75 in October, said Matthew Edvardsen, a partner in the business since 2014, will succeed him as CEO, but he would not say when that might happen. “The transition is ongoing, but I am not the type of person who retires, as I am doing what I want with a great mixture of family, business, nonprofit work and recreation,” he said. Meeting demand Fowler said Spinnaker’s relentless pace reflects a simple reality: the nation is millions of housing units short of meeting demand. “We’re four to five million units short in this country, and it’s getting worse, and we’re particularly short on affordable housing,” he said. Access to affordable housing, Fowler added, is critical to giving children stable, safe environments in which to grow into healthy adults and, eventually, homeowners who contribute to local tax bases. “Shelter and security are key,” he said. “That means a home where a young person can feel safe, have a family to support them and grow and learn without fear of not being housed, or being assaulted. Housing is the beginning of building good families and good citizens.” The shortage is particularly acute in high-cost regions like Fairfield County, he said, where many working families can’t afford to buy homes. The solution, in his view, is building denser housing in the right places. “We’re not taking a pristine 10 acres that’s previously been either in single-family zoning, or in a farm district,” Fowler said. “It’s where that job should be, in an area with lots of services around good transportation.” CT pipeline One of Spinnaker’s largest ongoing Connecticut projects is rising on the former site of the New Haven Coliseum, where the developer is leading a multiyear, multiphase redevelopment expected to deliver hundreds of market-rate and affordable apartments to the city’s downtown. The first phase — called Anthem at Square 10 — was completed six months ago and includes a seven-story, 200-unit apartment building with ground-floor retail and public open space. Already, 72% of those apartments are leased, Fowler said. Future phases will add hundreds of more apartments, additional commercial space and a bioscience building. Spinnaker is also pursuing a high-profile redevelopment in Fairfield, where it plans to replace an aging hotel on Post Road with either a 250-unit apartment building paired with a 110-room hotel, or a 478-unit apartment complex. Both options have been approved by the town’s Planning and Zoning Commission, but are being appealed by residents. “We very much want to do the 250 units with the hotel,” Fowler said. “It’s a really good-looking job.” The larger 478-unit proposal was filed in December under the state’s 8-30g affordable housing statute, just before Fairfield enacted a four-year affordable housing moratorium. Fowler said that project includes more apartments to offset the lower rents of the affordable units in the plan. To qualify under the state’s 8-30g law, at least 30% of a project’s units must be considered affordable, with rents tied to the area’s median income. In Hartford, Spinnaker is putting the finishing touches on 55 Elm Club, a 164-unit apartment complex created by renovating a historic state office building at 55 Elm St., and a nearby annex building. The Elm Club began leasing late last year, and includes a mix of one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments. Elsewhere in the state, Spinnaker is working on projects in Cheshire and Norwalk, while advancing separate developments in New Haven and Westport. Its largest recently completed developments include The Audubon New Haven, a 467-unit mixed-use complex on Orange Street, and Sono Central, a 150-unit development in South Norwalk. Both opened last year. Spinnaker also has several projects outside of Connecticut that are either finished or nearing completion, including in Charlotte, North Carolina; Nashville; St. Louis, Missouri; and Portland, Oregon. Fowler said Spinnaker funds projects mainly through bank loans backed by its own equity, in addition to state and federal loans, grants and tax credits. Spinnaker, for example, has received project financing from the Capital Region Development Authority (CRDA), which provided the company a $7 million permanent loan and $6.5 million bridge loan for 55 Elm Club. CRDA Executive Director Michael Freimuth said the 55 Elm apartments are a key component of a larger plan to redevelop parking lots and vacant blocks around the Bushnell Performing Arts Center into a vibrant neighborhood. “55 Elm is significant in that it is the first housing project to come online within the Bushnell South development area, jump-starting the longer-term vision of converting the vacant buildings and parcels that dominate the area into a new neighborhood,” Freimuth said. “55 Elm and the overall Bushnell South area seeks to reconnect the downtown area with its most immediate neighborhood to the south.”