SUGAR LAND, TEXAS — Berkadia has arranged $21.9 million in financing for One Sugar Creek Center/Comerica Bank Building, an office property located in Sugar Land. Corby Chaffin and Steve Comly of Berkadia’s Houston and Philadelphia offices, respectively, secured the fixed-rate loan through an unnamed life insurance company. Chaffin and Comly originated the financing on behalf of the borrower, Equus Investment Partnership IX, a discretionary fund managed by Equus Capital Partners Ltd. Equus’ business plans call for capital improvements and amenity upgrades to the property. The 11-story property spans 193,998 square feet and is situated on 4.5 acres. Amenities include a deli, banking facility, surface parking and an attached four-level parking garage. Built in 1983, the property is 89 percent occupied. One Sugar Creek Center/Comerica Bank Building is located at 1 Sugar Creek Center Blvd. and is 20 miles southwest of downtown Houston. The property offers access to US Highway 59, US Highway 90A and State Highway 6.
CERRITOS, CALIF. — Carmenita Corporate Plaza, a 68,779-square-foot office building in Cerritos, has sold to a private exchange buyer for an undisclosed sum. The plaza is located at 13340 183rd St. It is fully leased to Infinity Property & Casualty Corporation. CBRE’s Kevin Shannon, Paul Jones and Blake Bokosky represented the seller, an affiliate of Cohen Asset Management.
UPSTATE NEW YORK; HARTFORD, CONN.; AND PHILADELPHIA — Equity Commonwealth (NYSE: EQC), a real estate investment trust (REIT) based in Chicago, has sold 13 properties in three separate transactions totaling $261 million. In the first transaction, the company sold an 11-property portfolio of small office assets totaling 2 million square feet in upstate New York for $104.6 million. The company also sold City Place, an 868,000-square-foot office property at 185 Asylum St. in Hartford, Conn., for $113.3 million. The office is the tallest building in Hartford. As of June 30, the property was 98.7 percent leased. In the third transaction, Equity Commonwealth sold an undisclosed property at the corner of North 16th and Race streets in Philadelphia for $43 million. The 609,000-square-foot vacant property is currently vacant. The buyers in all three sales were not disclosed. Concurrent with the dispositions, Equity Commonwealth has doubled its share buyback program from $100 million to $200 million. The company has repurchased 3.4 million shares of its common stock at an average price of $25.76 per share for a total investment of $87.8 million. The company currently has $112.2 million available for share repurchases over the next 12 months. Equity Commonwealth’s stock price closed …
WALL TOWNSHIP, N.J. — Holliday Fenoglio Fowler (HFF) has arranged $23.7 million in refinancing for a four-building office complex in Wall Township. Located at 1800 Route 34, the 189,836-square-foot complex is occupied by French & Parrello, First Credit Union, The Earle Companies, KMB Design Group, Secova Securities and Eckman Recycling. Constructed between 2001 and 2007, the property is 95 percent leased. Michael Klein led the HFF debt placement team that arranged the 10-year, fixed-rate loan through CIBC World Markets for the borrower, The Donato Group.
INDIANAPOLIS — Cushman & Wakefield | Summit Realty Group has arranged the sale of 130 E Washington St., a 203,250-square-foot office building in downtown Indianapolis for $9.2 million. Cushman & Wakefield (C&W)|Summit marketed the property on behalf of the seller, Perennial Washington St. LLC. Onward Investors LLC purchased the asset. The building was formerly known as the Meyer-Kiser Bank Building. Tenants of the property include Arcadis and the national governing bodies of USA Track and Field, Diving, Gymnastics, and Synchronized Swimming. Summit Realty Group has also been retained by new ownership to oversee property management and leasing of the project.
DEDHAM, MASS. — Holliday Fenoglio Fowler (HFF) has brokered the $7 million sale and arranged $4.7 million in acquisition financing for a 39,391-square-foot office building located at 20 Carematrix Drive in Dedham. Coleman Benedict and Ben Sayles of HFF represented the seller, an affiliate of The Bulfinch Companies Inc. Lauren O’Neil, also of HFF, led the debt placement team that arranged the acquisition financing for the buyer, an affiliate of NorthBridge CRE Advisors. The financing was arranged through Country Bank.
LOS ANGELES — Ivanhoé Cambridge and its partner Callahan Capital Properties have acquired a full interest in the PacMutual office property in Downtown Los Angeles for $200 million. The property is located at 523 W. 6th St. The three buildings contain a total of 464,000 square feet. They are interconnected. PacMutual is situated near the 7th Street retail corridor, L.A. LIVE entertainment complex, Staples Center arena, Broadway Theater District, South Park neighborhood, and mixed-use developments like the Bloc and Wilshire Grand.
IRVINE, CALIF. — The Quintana office campus, a 421,935-square-foot office campus in Irvine, has received $100 million in financing. The floating-rate debt package will finance the acquisition, redevelopment and re-tenanting of the Class A property, which Hines purchased in August. The four-building Quintana campus is situated at the intersection of Main Street and Von Karman Avenue in the Irvine Business Complex. One of the buildings is fully leased to StrataCare, a wholly owned subsidiary of Xerox Corporation. The remaining three are vacant. Quintana represents the largest block of contiguous office space currently available for a large user in Orange County. It is also the only remaining big block in the airport area, according to New York Life Real Estate Investors, which originated the funds on behalf of institutional investors. HFF’s Kevin MacKenzie worked on behalf of Hines. The floating rate debt package has a total available term of five years.
HOUSTON — Cousins Properties Inc., a publicly traded office REIT based in Atlanta, has signed two new leases totaling 64,000 square feet at Greenway Plaza, a 10-building, 4.4 million-square-foot office complex in Houston. The first lease is a 10-year expansion and relocation that Cousins signed with an existing Greenway Plaza customer. This customer, a financial firm headquartered in Houston, is moving from 44,000 square feet in 3800 Buffalo Speedway to 48,000 square feet in Greenway Plaza Three, which was recently vacated by ExxonMobil. In the second transaction, a publishing firm new to Greenway Plaza signed a seven-and-a-half-year lease for 16,000 square feet at 3800 Buffalo Speedway.
LOS ANGELES — Loyola Marymount University (LMU) in Los Angeles has debuted its new $110 million Life Sciences building. Construction on the 100,000-square-foot project began in June 2013. The new Life Sciences building houses faculty and research staff from the biology, chemistry and biochemistry, health and human sciences, civil engineering, and environmental science departments under the Seaver College of Science and Engineering. It provides modernized laboratories and collaborative research space. The three-story facility contains 35 teaching labs, 40 faculty and staff offices, nine informal student study spaces, a green roof and outdoor laboratory, three conference rooms and a 273-seat auditorium with an adjoining 1,800-square-foot terrace. C.W. Driver constructed the new building, which CO Architects designed.