Pier 4 Real Estate Investment Trust has made its biggest acquisition, the nine-building, 558-unit Royal Oak Terrace apartment complex in London, Ont.

The complex, located on 22 acres at 1126-1154 Adelaide St. N. and comprised of buildings ranging from three to nine storeys, was acquired for $102.5 million from a private family in an off-market transaction that closed today (Feb. 25).

“It's mid- to low-rise and fits our buying strategy, with under-market rents to allow us to go in and do our value-add program,” Pier 4 REIT co-founder and chief financial officer Michael Ashby told RENX. The interview also involved his brother Adam, the company’s co-founder and chief executive officer, and vice-president of finance Jake Levy.

The size of the complex will also enable the Toronto-based private REIT to take advantage of economies of scale, he added. 

“We're familiar with being a landlord in London and we’re quite fond of the market, so it added to our investment strategy in that city,” Levy said.

Pier 4 REIT acquired a 17-unit apartment building in London shortly after it was founded in June 2020 and has added properties in the city since then.

Property maintenance and intensification potential

Pier 4 REIT plans to maintain Royal Oak Terrace to its existing standard while seeking to elevate the living experience for residents. While it will upgrade lighting and do some retrofitting to enhance the energy efficiency of the buildings, there are no major capital expenditure plans for the complex at this point.

The Royal Oak Terrace property includes a dog park and a playground. Its location in northeastern London is convenient for public transit and is in relatively close proximity to schools, stores, restaurants and services.

Royal Oak Terrace’s former owners enlisted Siv-ik Planning and Design Inc. to explore opportunities to intensify underused and vacant portions of the property. A preliminary concept plan envisioned two 14-storey apartment buildings with 215 units each, along with 563 parking stalls, being developed along Adelaide Road North.

Pier 4 REIT did due diligence on the potential to increase the density of Royal Oak Terrace and Adam Ashby said the prospects for intensification added to the property’s allure.

“Our focus under Pier 4 isn't to develop, so it's not something that we're looking to capitalize on in the immediate future,” he explained. 

“But I think it does bring a value proposition as well as a long-term opportunity not only for the current investors within Pier 4, but also long-term value appreciation for the overall asset itself by having those existing buildings plus that ability to add units down the line.” 

Pier 4 REIT’s portfolio

Before this latest deal closed, Pier 4 REIT had a portfolio of more than 40 properties in 13 communities in Ontario, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. It had more than 2,000 units at buildings valued at more than $425 million under management.

Royal Oak Terrace is the trust’s first acquisition of 2026 and follows a busy 2025 when it acquired approximately $90 million worth of properties.

This included multifamily properties in Hamilton, Waterloo, Kitchener and London in Ontario as well as in Dartmouth, N.S. and Moncton, N.B.

“Our investment thesis is to target secondary markets across Canada, and particularly to continue to grow in markets which we're currently invested in,” Adam Ashby said.

Future growth

Pier 4 REIT launched at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic when Adam Ashby said they were seeing 20-plus offers for apartment buildings. The market slowed down as interest rates rose, but he thinks momentum is returning to the asset class and he’s optimistic about where it will go in the future.

“We're extremely proud of how far we’ve come and what we've been able to achieve in a six-year time frame,” he said, adding that Pier 4 REIT has been able to increase the size of its team and add to its expertise.

There’s nothing else in Pier 4 REIT’s acquisition pipeline that it’s able to talk about at this point. While not naming specific cities, Adam Ashby said it wants to continue making accretive additions in secondary markets.

“We're still strong believers in the Canadian multifamily market and are continuing to acquire good properties across growing markets within Canada.”