Port Richmond Apartment Project Lands $36 Million in Construction Financing

PHILADELPHIA — Riverwards Group has secured $35.8 million in construction financing for Somerset Phase II, a 170-unit apartment project at 2202 E. Somerset St. in Port Richmond, at a time when few developers in the city are starting new apartment buildings.

D2 Capital Advisors arranged the package, announced Oct. 13. It combines a $19.87 million senior construction loan from Silver Heights Capital with $15.96 million of Commercial Property Assessed Clean Energy debt, known as C-PACE, from Nuveen Green Capital. Riverwards is contributing more than $10 million of its own equity toward a total project cost of about $46 million.

The 146,158-square-foot building will hold 76 studios, 38 one-bedrooms and 56 two-bedroom units, plus on-site garage parking. Construction is expected to finish in early 2028. The project also carries a grandfathered 10-year, 100 percent real estate tax abatement that new projects can no longer obtain.

C-PACE debt, which is repaid through a property assessment rather than a conventional mortgage, will fund energy-efficiency measures. Nuveen provided about $18 million of similar financing on the project’s first phase in 2023, which Bisnow described as the first multifamily project in Pennsylvania financed that way.

That first phase gives the developer a track record in the neighborhood. Its 220 apartments were fully occupied and sold to the Philadelphia Housing Authority in May 2025 for $58.1 million.

Riverwards managing partner Mo Rushdy says the bet on Port Richmond is deliberate. “When you go into locations that have not historically seen much development, your land basis is way less and you’re able to provide housing, the naturally occurring affordable housing,” Rushdy told Bisnow. Building where land is cheap, he argues, is one way to keep rents in check.