Taking care of the nitty gritty in nearly 50-year-old apartments

The Clifton Plaza Apartments, a 10-story multifamily building for senior citizens who receive housing subsidies, is about to get a new $20 million lease on life.

Owned by an affiliate of Renewal Development Associates, the 107-suite apartment has received a new round of low-income housing tax credits that required the Portland, Maine-based specialist to repurchase the property and refinance it for $6 million.

Renewal Development has owned the structure since 2005, when it acquired the property from the late real estate developer and radio station owner Xenophon Zapis.

The structure, which has one and two-bedroom suites and views of Lake Erie and a site near neighborhood shopping, dates from 1974.

Rich Galicz, a Willoughby-based development associated of Renewal Development, said in a phone interview that the newest project completes work that the company could not afford in a prior renovation. The work is essential but not cosmetic.

“We’re adding sprinklers throughout the building, which is a major item, along with new boilers,” Galicz said. “We’ll convert six suites to full (Americans Disability Act) compliance.”

An Ohio Housing Finance Authority presentation said the project also will include updating heating and ventilating equipment and elevators. The agency is the conduit for divvying out low-income tax credits in the Buckeye State.

The project’s capital stack includes $3 million in low-income tax credits and a $10 million construction loan, which was not filed for public record as of last Thursday, May 5.

Drake Construction of Cleveland will do the work, according to county records and the Ohio Housing Finance Authority.

Tenants in the property are in the federal Section 8 program, which limits their rent to 25% of their income.

The federal government pays the remainder of what the landlord calculates is a market rent for the building.

The project dates from an era when the federal government dramatically funded and underwrote loans to widen the availability for senior housing. Now the properties show their age. They also date from before the most recent round of senior housing projects that have been embraced by private developers using market-rate loans.