The future owners of Biddeford’s Pepperell Mill campus have issued a statement to business owners and residents who call the campus home, reassuring them that rent will not skyrocket once the sale is final.

“If you have seen this news coverage, we want to put your minds at ease and assure you that rents at the Pepperell Mill will not be increasing in the amounts referenced,” wrote Chris Rhoades and Andrew Preston, representing real estate investment firm Presidium, which is closing on the property’s sale this month.

The statement has reassured some, but as the city wrestles with ongoing affordable housing challenges, some officials and tenants are concerned.

Last month, various media outlets reported that Rhoades and Preston were buying the Pepperell Mill buildings in Biddeford, and soon afterward the property was listed on Crowdstreet, a website that invites others to invest online in real estate properties nationwide. The listing included a video describing the property.

The video, which has since been taken down, did not sit well among those working to create affordable commercial and residential properties in the city. 

Soon after the property was listed on the site, a collection of local officials, led by Maine House Speaker and Biddeford resident Ryan Fecteau, issued a joint statement critical of the new owners. Fecteau noted that the new owners talked about the future value of the property in the video and indicated rents for residents are 20-35% below market value, while commercial rents were 20-50% below market value. 

Fecteau and other critics interpreted the presentation as a sign that the new owners were planning some radical changes.

“What they were saying was there was more potential value in the property,” said Amy Clearwater, a Biddeford city councilor who represents an area that includes the Pepperell Mill. “It looked like they were saying, ‘Yeah, yeah, we can raise the rents.’”

One of the complex’s business tenants, Lisa Parker, owner of the bakery Cakes for all Seasons, said she was put off by the way word leaked out about the sale — and the video in particular.

“I thought that the way it was announced was unpleasant,” she said.

Fecteau, in the statement, said raising rents by the values described in the video would severely impact the tenants in the mill properties.

“If they come even within earshot of double-digit percentage increases, it would be no doubt devastating for families and businesses located in the mills,” he said.

Biddeford’s mill district includes a series of more than 30 brick structures clustered along the Saco River. The buildings are a monument to the area’s blue-collar past, when Biddeford and many other cities in New England were part of the nation’s manufacturing and industrial center.

Today, none of the buildings are used for industrial purposes. One of the district’s last true industrial users, Casella Waste Systems, sold its property to the city for $6.65 million in 2012.

Around that time, according to Biddeford Mayor Alan Casavant, the city council began to explore the purchase of other properties, which spurred interest among developers.

“There was a rapid interest in those mill buildings,” he said.

Casavant said one of those developers was Douglas Sanford. He purchased the Pepperell Mill properties in the 2000s, according to Casavant’s joint statement with Fecteau, and he said Sanford went to work developing the properties. Today, according to the statement, approximately 150 residents and 150 commercial tenants reside in the mill properties.

Casavant said he appreciated how Sanford’s focus was on spurring growth and lowering rents.

“Affordability was the key,” he said.

Data from the U.S. Census, Maine Housing Authority and the Biddeford Planning Department support local concerns about the state of affordable housing in the area. 

Current census data shows Biddeford’s median household income is $53,120 — up from an estimated $50,327 in 2018, while data from the city’s planning department indicates the average rent in Biddeford has gone up 40% since 2010. 

The Maine Housing Authority tracks annual rental rates in Biddeford compared to “fair market rent,” or the ability of renters to afford a standard two-bedroom apartment based on median income. 

According to authority figures, both values were about the same in 2010 — with the fair market rent level at $862, slightly higher than the monthly rental average for a two-bedroom apartment at the time, which was $835. In 2020, the average monthly rent of $1,211 far outpaced fair market rent, which the authority estimated was only $1,051.

The data also reflects concerns about homelessness in the city. Data from the 2020 Census indicates 11.7% of the city’s population of 22,522 live in poverty. 

Casavant said the city wants to see more affordable properties, not less. If rents at Pepperell Mill go up, he said, he fears other property owners might follow suit. 

“That jeopardizes everything we’ve been doing,” he said.

It will hurt commercial renters in the mill district too, Casavant said, not just residents.

“They’re just small businesses, and their profit margins aren’t great,” he said.

Neither Rhodes nor Preston responded to a request for an interview. Rhodes’ LinkedIn page lists him as a partner at Presidium, and both he and Preston have worked in the past to renovate buildings at the former Brunswick Naval Air Station.

Presidium Real Estate, based in Dallas, buys properties and turns them into housing in Texas and Jacksonville, Fla., according to the company’s website. 

Both men made headlines earlier this year when they announced they were purchasing the iconic Time & Temperature building on Congress Street in downtown Portland.

After releasing the joint statement with Fecteau, Casavant said he met with Rhodes and Preston to express his concerns about Biddeford rents. Following that meeting, the future owners sent out an email to tenants “to correct misinformation” about the sale and its implications for renters. In an undated copy of the email, they apologized to tenants for the way word of the sale leaked to the media, and discussed the sale in broad terms. They also assured renters that the terms of their current leases would not be changing.

“All existing leases will be honored, and any rent increases proposed as leases expire will be reasonable and well in alignment with past market rent increases both on commercial and residential leases,” the owners wrote.

Clearwater, the Biddeford city councilor, said the communication from the owners did put her at ease, and many of her constituents who rent property at Pepperell Mill, she said, felt better, too.

“Certainly people said they were reassured,” she said. 

Parker, however, is taking a wait-and-see approach. She has run Cakes for all Seasons out of her location in the Pepperell Mill complex for the past three years, and still has two years left on her five-year lease. 

Parker said she doesn’t fear her rent will go up now, but she doesn’t know if the new owners will increase her rent when she tries to renew her lease, and she’s worried about her fellow tenants.

“It makes me really unhappy for my neighbors who have shorter leases,” she said.

Casavant said the email was a good start, but he is also waiting to see if things actually work out well for the tenants.

“(The new owners) listened, and the letter that went out to the tenants was a result of that conversation, but more needs to be done,” he said. “At some point, if it doesn’t bear fruit, we’re going to have to consider other options.”

Casavant declined to discuss the options in detail, but said they were limited.