Only eight months after investing in a portfolio of two dozen rent-regulated Bronx properties, a private equity fund known as Hudson Realty Capital is now putting several of the buildings, including 1985-1995 Botanical Square South in Bedford Park, up for sale at prices significantly below what it paid for them.

Tenant advocates who have long worried that private equity groups, with their mandate for quick returns on investments whatever the cost, threatened the borough and city’s affordable housing stock.

But now, it appears Hudson and other private equity funds may have over-reached and are now trying to cut their losses.

Hudson’s efforts to sell low could be indicative of “a misstep in the private equity misery,” said Benjamin Dulchin, advocacy director of the Association of Neighborhood and Housing Development (ANHD), a nonprofit group that focuses on affordable housing.

At the height of the recent real estate boom, many private equity investors poured capital into rent-regulated housing, assuming that if apartments could be released from regulation (through vacancies and capital improvements), rents would increase dramatically and swell investors’ incomes.

Hudson Realty Capital has not caught the eye of advocates before, but their partners in the Bronx portfolio of 1,449 apartment units, the Pinnacle Group, has been criticized by advocates for using aggressive tactics to drive out tenants. In 2006, the company submitted to an agreement with the New York State Attorney General to provide redress to tenants claiming they had been overcharged for rent.

Last summer, Hudson bought into the Bronx apartment portfolio (they purchased the investment from the Praedium Group) for a sale price that housing policy experts said was some 10 percent above market value. The high sale price and the landlord’s debt obligations could lead to maintenance cutbacks or an aggressive effort to hike rents, the experts said.

“Unless there are other elements of this deal not apparent on the surface, the sales price suggests that Hudson is working with a profit margin so thin as to be hard to see,” said Harold Shultz, Senior Fellow of Citizens Housing and Planning Council.

Those fears remain, but it seems Hudson and Pinnacle are trying to cut at least some its losses or raise capital by selling off some of the portfolio.

One of the properties, 1985-1995 Botanical Square South in Bedford Park, is listed on the website of realtor Massey Knakal for $14.5 million, though Hudson acquired the building for $17.3 million last June. At least three other buildings — 1121-1171 Morrison Ave., 2254 Cedar Ave. and 2269 Hampden Place — are also selling for less than the purchase price.

Shane Kavanagh, a spokesman of both Hudson and Pinnacle, declined to comment on the sale for this article, though, in an e-mail exchange with the Norwood News in December, he said that Pinnacle was still the “primary owner,” despite Hudson’s investment last June, and planned “to continue to invest the necessary resources to maintain [the apartments] to the highest standard.”

According to realty firm Massey Knakal, the buildings were placed on the market that same month.

[The ownership relationship between Pinnacle and Hudson remains unclear, but housing experts say Hudson is essentially just the financial backer of the investment portfolio, while Pinnacle manages the properties and provides advice to Hudson on ownership decisions.]

Dan DeSloover of the Urban Homesteading Assistance Board said the current terms of loans from New York Community Bank require the landlord to make higher monthly payments beginning in June 2010, and DeSloover said this would pressure even a principled landlord to cut back on repairs or drive out long-term tenants to raise rents.

Gregory Lobo Jost of University Neighborhood Housing Program, a local non-profit, agreed that no matter who owns the properties, the mortgage terms should be changed in order to protect tenants and preserve the buildings.

Ilene A. Angarola, a spokesperson for New York Community Bank, said that it’s routine for the bank to thoroughly vet buyers of their mortgaged buildings, but that the original terms of the loan would probably apply.

It’s not just Pinnacle and Hudson feeling the pinch. ANHD has identified nine affordable housing portfolios in the city facing severe financial problems.

Riverton Houses in Harlem, owned by Stellar Management and the Rockport Group, is now in foreclosure. And the owners of Stuyvesant Town/Peter Cooper Village in downtown Manhattan, Tishman Speyer and BlackRock, are trying to raise capital to stave off default.