Vantage in Dedham. Image courtesy of Stantec
Nordblom Company’s multifamily development pipeline is accelerating with milestones on three projects that could deliver 675 housing units in Greater Boston.
Boston officials announced Tuesday they will support tax breaks designed to jumpstart Nordblom’s redevelopment of the Audacy radio studios property at 83 Leo Birmingham Highway in Brighton as 333 apartments.
In its hometown of Burlington, Nordblom Company received Planning Board approval this month for the town’s first MBTA Communities development. The 188-unit apartment complex at 129 and 131 Middlesex Turnpike will replace a pair of 1970s-era office buildings across from Nordblom’s 3rd Ave mixed-use development.
And in Dedham, the developer has started construction of Vantage, a 154-unit apartment complex at 110 Stergis Way near the Legacy Place retail center.
Nordblom purchased the nearly 4-acre 110 Stergis Way industrial park in 2018 because of the attractive location near Legacy Place and an MBTA commuter rail station.
“These were single-story buildings that we thought we would upgrade and renovate, and then we realized there was an opportunity to take them down,” said Todd Fremont-Smith, Nordblom’s senior vice president of development.
Eastern Bank provided a $54.6 million construction loan. Nordblom Company capitalizes deals on an individual basis, Fremont-Smith said, and raised equity for the Dedham project through a “friends and family” network amid headwinds in the institutional capital markets.
Burlington-based Erland Construction has started work on the Dedham project following demolition and site preparation. Designed by Stantec, the project replaces a pair of aging commercial buildings with 131 market-rate apartments and 23 income-restricted units. Occupancy is scheduled for spring 2028.
Nordblom Company has experience with commercial to housing redevelopments at its 3rd Ave property in Burlington, where portions of a business park were demolished for the Huntington and Tremont apartment complexes along with Wegmans and other retailers in the previous decade.
“The whole concept of doing 3rd Ave. in the middle of a 1960s industrial park really worked, and we are focused on residential,” Fremont-Smith said.
Last fall, Burlington town meeting approved expansion of the town’s MBTA Communities district to encompass the Nordblom-owned office buildings across Middlesex Turnpike from 3rd Ave. This month, the Planning Board approved their replacement with 188 apartments.
The Boston project could be catalyzed by the Wu administration’s new targeted tax abatement program, which is designed to help developers break ground on major multifamily projects that are approved but unable to complete financing packages. Estimated at $115 million in July 2025, the 83 Leo Birmingham Highway site was one of four projects selected in the initial round, subject to approval by the Boston Assessing Department.
Another project is proposed in Brookline’s Coolidge Corner, where Nordblom Company is seeking to rezone a parking lot at 26 Pleasant St. for a 103-unit apartment building.
Nordblom Co. plans to build 330 apartments on the site of the WEEI radio station in Brighton. Image courtesy of Stantec
