Story from the daily targum.

With the loss of a home comes a wealth of new opportunities for members of the Phi Sigma Kappa fraternity.

"It's a really great thing. Now we literally have a budget to work with and flexibility to support the undergraduate chapter, whereas in the past we were broke and were constantly in debt trying to fix everything, like the house's pipes and sprinklers," said Albert Hakim, a 1990 alumnus who became a member of Phi Sigma Kappa in 1986. "Before, we couldn't support scholarships or rush because we had no money. But now we've paid our debt, and we're really able to offer the proper support."

The University's chapter of the fraternity was created in 1959.

Hakim said Construction Management Associates, a private developer in New Brunswick, recently purchased the Phi Sigma Kappa house on 32 Union St. on the College Avenue campus, which was built in the late 1800s and bought by the fraternity in 1962.

The owners of the house, the Phi Sigma Kappa Alumni Association, sold the house for a substantial sum, said Jim Horvath, a 1968 University alumnus who became a member of Phi Sigma Kappa in 1964. Both Hakim and Horvath are members of the fraternity's Board of Trustees.

The house was closed down more than a year ago due to maintenance concerns, and the developer plans to demolish it and develop a new kind of modern housing structure, Hakim said.

"Through our heyday in the '80s and '90s, the house needed significant repair and unfortunately banks don't lend money to fraternities very easily," Hakim said. "Within the last three to four years, it got to the point where the house needed to be completely renovated. It's unfortunate it has to go. It's been in New Brunswick for a long time."

Horvath, a retired attorney, said the alumni association is going to invest the money they received for the house to support the undergraduate brothers of the fraternity and their rush programming. Starting at the end of the semester, they will supply a $1,000 scholarship to each of the top six GPA earners in Phi Sigma Kappa every semester, for a total of $12,000 a year. Another goal is to purchase a new fraternity house in the future, he said.
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