AUSTIN, TEXAS — Locally based developer Industry ATX has broken ground on Industry SOMA, a 23-unit affordable housing project in Austin’s South Menchaca neighborhood. The townhome-style residences will be reserved for households earning 80 percent or less of the area median income. Mark Odom Studio designed the project, which is slated for a fall 2025 completion.
SOUTH PLAINFIELD, N.J. — Lee & Associates has brokered the $36.5 million sale of a 200,000-square-foot industrial property located at 18-20 Harmrich Road in South Plainfield, about 40 miles south of Manhattan. The two-building property sits on 18 acres and features clear heights of 28 feet, multiple loading docks and additional outdoor storage space. Rick Marchisio, Crista Governara and Drew Maffey of Lee & Associates represented the undisclosed seller and the buyer, Boston-based investment firm Marcus Partners, in the off-market transaction.
EAST GREENBUSH, N.Y. — Commercial finance and advisory firm Axiom Capital Corp. has arranged an $11.6 million permanent loan for the refinancing of a 194,889-square-foot shopping center located in the Upstate New York community of East Greenbush. The property comprises five buildings on a 33.3-acre site and is currently leased to 19 tenants. Axiom Capital arranged the 10-year, fixed-rate loan on behalf of the undisclosed borrower. The name of the direct lender and property were also not disclosed.
NEW YORK CITY — Locally based brokerage firm TerraCRG has negotiated the $8 million sale of a 17,900-square-foot vacant industrial building in Brooklyn’s Red Hook neighborhood. Dan Marks, Daniel Lebor and Jackson O’Neill of TerraCRG represented the seller, an entity doing business as Buttermilk Warehouse LLC, in the transaction. The name of the locally based buyer was not disclosed.
NEW YORK CITY — CBRE has secured a 30,688-square-foot office sublease at One SoHo Square, a 768,000-square-foot building located at 233 Spring St. in Manhattan’s Hudson Square district. Harly Stevens, Jared Freede and Josh Pernice of CBRE represented the subtenant, e-commerce marketing platform Yotpo, which is relocating from 400 Lafayette Street, in the negotiations. The original tenant was Flatiron Health. Stellar Management owns One SoHo Square.
PHILADELPHIA — UBS Financial Services has signed a 22,625-square-foot office lease at 1735 Market Street, a 54-story building in downtown Philadelphia. UBS will relocate within the building to a space on the 44th floor in August 2023. Jack Meyers of Cushman & Wakefield represented the tenant in the lease negotiations. Internal agents Jeremy Moss and Keith Cody, along with Anthony LiVecchi, Tom Weitzel and Mitch Marcus of JLL, represented the landlord, a partnership between Silverstein Properties and Arden Group.
Elizabeth Barnes, COO of NAI Plotkin, knows property management is always a labor- and people-intensive profession, no matter the day or time of year. In that regard, the pandemic did not change the best practices for the Springfield, Mass.-based full-service brokerage and management company. “The number-one best practice has always been — and remains to this day — to manage the property as if you own it, with the awareness that you don’t,” Barnes says. Treat the Asset as Your Own For Barnes, this means focusing on the asset’s value at all times. “Common area maintenance (CAM) reconciliation, capital planning, value engineering options — they need to be front and center,” she continues. “It’s not just about cutting expenses. Look at how you can add value or reduce upfront costs.” All this should be done, she states, with the owner’s goals for the property in mind. Those goals may differ based on whether the owner is, for example, looking to divest the asset. Or if the tenant’s space has gone dark. Or if a pandemic is occurring. “There is a definite focus on health and safety now, regardless of the product type,” Barnes says. “Many owners wanted HVAC and air-handling …
DURHAM, N.C. – CBRE Investment Management, on behalf of a separate account client, has acquired Park Point, a 662,607-square-foot life sciences campus located within Research Triangle Park in Durham. Although the seller and price were not disclosed, Triangle Business Journal reports that Starwood Capital sold the asset for $288 million. Starwood, along with Trinity Capital and Vanderbilt, acquired Park Point in 2019 as a vacant, single-tenant industrial building, implementing a $190 million adaptive reuse project at the 95-acre site. The property now offers flexible space solutions for office, life sciences and manufacturing tenants. Located at 4001 NC Highway 54, campus amenities include a fitness center, cafe, indoor/outdoor common areas, athletic fields, walking trails, 2,546 parking spaces and a conference and training center. Park Point also has new, efficient systems that reduce energy and water consumption and enhance indoor air quality. Electric vehicle charging stations are slated to be installed at the property. “Today’s life sciences end-users have very specific and sophisticated needs for lab and research spaces,” said Sondra Wenger, head of Americas commercial operator division for CBRE Investment Management. “We believe that Park Point meets those needs and fits well with our investment strategy. This uniquely amenitized asset benefits …
The retail market in the Orlando MSA is doing well, on the surface. According to the numbers, the region has recovered from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Orlando’s economy is heavily driven by tourism and when travel stopped and the initial state-wide shutdown orders went into effect on April 3, 2020, the impacts were profound and widespread, since four of the top 10 employers in Central Florida are in hospitality or retail, as well as Orlando International Airport. Since then, life in Central Florida has largely returned to normal. Tourism is back, hotel occupancy is up and people are dining out again. Retail numbers for the second quarter are actually better than in the first quarter of 2019, according to CoStar Group. The availability percentage at the beginning of 2019 was 5.9 percent, compared to 4.7 percent at the end of the second quarter. The average rent is up as well, rising from $21.94 per square foot to $25.52. Consumer habits have changed as e-commerce is still enormously popular, although it’s now more about convenience than mitigating risks. For those who can, working from home has become the preferred mode. As a consequence of the remote work trend, local …
While the Research Triangle Park (RTP) is the heartbeat of all things life sciences in the Southeast, the outlying areas of the Raleigh-Durham market, commonly referred to as the Triangle, haven’t been ignored by expansive growth in the sector. Corporate announcements and expansions in Holly Springs, Sanford, Four Oaks and Hillsborough have been more prevalent in recent years, as well as in the home base of Raleigh. Amgen, a California based company, is constructing a $550 million biomanufacturing facility in Holly Springs, and Becton Dickinson recently selected Four Oaks in Johnston County for its new manufacturing site, with plans to invest approximately $25 million in the development. After many years of focusing on the manufacturing industry, Lee County, approximately 40 miles from Raleigh, is becoming a burgeoning hub for life sciences after the expansions of Pfizer’s 230-acre site. A subsidiary of Abzena chose Sanford following a nationwide search for its 325-job manufacturing facility. Also in Sanford, Astellas Gene Therapies delivered a $109 million facility in the second quarter, its first outside California. It is evident that investors and developers see great opportunity in both the heart of the Triangle’s urban cores and rapidly growing outlying counties. Developers are responding to …