A long vacant set of former department store warehouse buildings has a new lease on life, as the AM&A's Warehouse Lofts project opens today with residential tenants and a collections agency moving in immediately.

Rocco Termini will unveil his mixed-use conversion of the deteriorated warehouses at 369 Washington St. into 48 apartments and 15,000 square feet of commercial space.

The completion of the eagerly awaited project marks a big accomplishment for Termini, and a turnaround for a large derelict parcel in the center of Buffalo.

The yearlong, $12 million project required a complex array of financing involving historic and other tax credits, as well as nine public and private sources of outside capital, to revive the century-old landmark structure.

"It had been vacant for 15 years, so financing was very difficult," said Termini, who led

the project through his Signature Development Buffalo LLC company. "Without the New Markets Tax Credits financing, it never would have gotten done." Those federal credits are geared to help urban redevelopment.

Built in 1892 as a dry-goods store, the building was later used by the Adam Meldrum &

Anderson store as a warehouse until the business closed. In redoing the building, Signature kept the original hardwood floors, extensive brick and marble, and 14-foot ceilings.

The 65,000-square-foot complex includes 50,000 square feet of residential space, featuring 36 one-bedroom apartments and 12 two-bedroom units. Rents range from $850 to $1,175 per month, depending on variations in size. There are also two workout rooms for residents.

As of today, 45 of the 48 apartments are rented, with tenants ready to move in as early as Saturday. However, Termini said he is offering half a month's rent free for tenants as an incentive to encourage them to stagger their moves over the next 15 days, so as not to overwhelm the building at once.

About 30 percent of the tenants are medical residents or fellows who are coming from out of town to work in the nearby medical corridor.

That's because, instead of working 18 hours straight, medical residents now work 10

hour-shifts and are on call for eight more hours. That means they may "have to get to work quickly," so "all the residents have to live within a few minutes of the hospital," Termini explained.

Collections firm P&B Acquisitions will occupy 15,000 square feet on the first floor, moving from smaller space it leased from Termini at Ellicott Commons above the Washington Street Market, at 465 Ellicott St. That will enable the company to more than double in staff from 50 employees currently to 130 within the next year ... up from just five employees five years ago.

"This is really a stimulus project," Termini said. "That's what the stimulus money was

intended to do."

The rehabilitation was funded primarily through a $7.4 million construction loan from

KeyBank, helped by an allocation of New Markets tax credits.

"KeyBank has been a valuable partner with us," Termini said. "They provided financing for a very difficult project that other banks wouldn't even consider."

Key sold the tax credits to investors and used that revenue to "buy down" the interest rate on the loan to 1 percent for the first two years and then 4.72 percent for the remaining five.

"The loan is very important to our position and visibility here in Buffalo," said Joseph G. Eicheldinger, senior relationship manager for Key Community Development Lending. "We make loans in the communities in which we serve and the mission of those loans is to revitalize urban neighborhoods and to encourage economic diversity and neighborhood reinvestment. This particular investment accomplishes all of those."

The project also qualified for federal historic tax credits, which Termini will then sell

to U.S. Bancorp's U.S. Bank Community Development Corp. in exchange for a $3.5 million equity investment that will reduce KeyBank's loan to $5.2 million.

And it involved participation from First Niagara Bank, Evans Bank, National Fuel Gas Co., National Grid USA, the Buffalo Economic Renaissance Corp., the Erie County Industrial Development Agency and the Empire State Development Corp.

"As the excitement of the redevelopment of downtown Buffalo gains momentum, KeyBank is committed to financing both new construction and historic renovations, especially in redeveloping neighborhoods," said Key's Buffalo district president, Gary Quenneville.

The completed complex is the first of three such major redevelopment efforts by Termini, who originally bought four warehouse buildings for $720,000 in June 2009. Three were of historical significance and were retained, but the fourth was knocked down using $400,000 from BERC to create 20 parking spaces. To ensure adequate parking, Termini has also rented additional spaces from the city, for a total of 60.

He also has an agreement to buy the nearby Hotel Lafayette, a once-opulent landmark opened in 1904. Termini plans to spend $35 million to convert the six-story, 367-room hotel into a mixed-use development with 115 market-rate apartments, a boutique suites hotel, five restaurants, 15,000 square feet of office space, and a banquet facility.

And he has an option to buy the 350,000 square-foot AM&A's department store building

itself, with plans for a $70 million renovation. That will include a 117-room Hilton Garden

Inn hotel, banquet center, meeting and conference space, food court, bar and restaurant, 28 independent senior-living apartments, 24 market-rate apartments, and 30,000 square feet of office space for Hamister Group's new headquarters.

But the other two projects are on hold until Albany passes legislation that would make

major changes to the state's historic tax credit program that Termini says are necessary to make the renovations viable. Termini said he has not even completed the purchases of the buildings.

"Everything's still pending," he said. "Without those credits, it's not do-able."