Coliving company Common is taking the struggles the industry has faced over the past year, and using it as an opportunity to expand and grow.
Over the past year, Common has taken over 2,000 units from other properties, and has plans to take over another 1,500 units in the next year. The units from the past year consisted of 1,668 traditional apartments and 473 coliving bedrooms.
At the moment, Amalia Paliobeis, senior managing director of real estate at Common, says the company is managing 5,000 units that are about evenly split between traditional apartments and coliving bedrooms. By the end of June, the company is anticipating to have 8,000 units.
“We’re continuing to grow exponentially, and we have [a] team that’s ready and working with a lot of different owners to take over traditional assets and also coliving assets,” said Paliobeis. “We’re still seeing the aftermath of some of these coliving competitors that have gone under, and we’re still getting those inbound.”
Last week, Common revealed that it had taken over 99 units that came to 239 bedrooms in Washington D.C.’s Union Market neighborhood from coliving competitor Quarters, which recently filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy.
Quarters investor W5 Group, which purchased a majority stake in the building in 2019, signed a management agreement with Common to manage the units after the bankruptcy filing.