the Editors of Commercial Property Executive
Lowe Enterprises Takes Industrial Facility in Central Los Angeles
Lowe Enterprises Investors, the investment management affiliate of national real estate company Lowe Enterprises, has acquired a 266,000-square-foot industrial distribution facility in central Los Angeles. The $31.5 million acquisition from an institutional owner was made on behalf of an investment client. “The downtown and central Los Angeles industrial area is consistently in high demand. It is the center of the region’s food and produce industry as well as the hub of the area’s distribution netwok” Bleecker Seaman, managing director, Lowe Enterprises Investors, said in a statement. The complex, located at 2652 Long Beach Ave., is fully leased until mid-2010.The building,…
Wells REIT II Takes Ownership of Newell Rubbermaid Global HQ
Wells Real Estate Investment Trust II today announced it has taken majority ownership at the newly built global headquarters building of Newell Rubbermaid in suburban Atlanta. With the completion of the property, Wells REIT II owns a majority stake in Three Glenlake, the 354,963-square-foot office tower recently completed on Glenlake Parkway, near Georgia 400 in Sandy Springs. The new headquarters was dedicated in ceremonies with Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue, Newell Rubbermaid President & CEO Mark Ketchum and Wells Real Estate Funds President Leo Wells.The new tower is next door to UPS’ world headquarters, in Atlanta’s Central Perimeter submarket. The modern,…
AvalonBay Nets Its Largest Bond Financing for San Fran Mixed-Use
AvalonBay Communities Inc. has received $135 million in financing–the multi-family REIT’s largest bond financing ever closed–to fund construction of Avalon Walnut Creek at Contra Centre, a $400 million mixed-use, transit-oriented development next to the San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit’s Pleasant Hill Bay station. Serving as AvalonBay’s finance counsel, law firm Goodwin Procter L.L.P. helped AvalonBay secure the letter of credit from Bank of America N.A., comprising $116 million in tax-exempt and $19 million in taxable multi-family housing revenue bonds. AvalonBay, Millennium Partners and the San Francisco BART comprise the partners investing in the public-private venture. While the first phase…
Newly Created Hill Entity Buys 2.2 MSF Philly Mixed-Use Project
Marlton, N.J.-based construction manager Hill International has created Hill International Real Estate Partners L.P., a real estate development services firm that will serve the commercial and hospitality industries across the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast. The newly formed entity has already made a grand move–the firm just acquired developer Walnut Street Capital’s interests in the 2.2 million-square-foot American Commerce Center project in Philadelphia. The establishment of HIREP fits with Hill’s strategic plan of expanding its offerings to include development services, as well as project management services for major endeavors. With the purchase of The American Commerce Center project, HIREP is starting out…
Bailout Deal Dies, Morgan Takes WaMu, Market Bets Now Off
For the day on Thursday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 196.89 points on the hope that a Wall Street bailout was a done deal. But all bets are off Friday as the news sinks in that no deal has been reached and and Morgan has bought the Washington Mutual Bank, which the FDIC had seized. The day after President Bush went to the airwaves to ask the nation for $700 billion, he met with the John McCain and Barack Obama, plus other Republican and Democratic leaders of Congress. It isn’t clear yet what happened at that meeting, but…
Baylor Breaks Ground on $212M Site, Plans $350M Cancer Center
Dallas-based Baylor Health Care System broke ground Tuesday on a $212 million 332,000-square-foot hospital in the Dallas suburb of McKinney. News reports indicate that Baylor also plans to announce Friday its intent to build a $350 million cancer center in Dallas. Located on 58 acres at the northwest corner of Highway 380 and Lake Forest Drive, Baylor Medical Center at McKinney will be a 95-bed, four-story hospital and medical office complex with a scheduled completion of November 2010. According to the Dallas Morning News and several other local news outlets, Baylor plans to announce on Friday a 450,000-square-foot cancer center…
Management Matters with Mike Myatt: Facing Up to Rogue CEOs
Rogue CEOs. Given the recent failures of banks and financial institutions previously thought to be untouchable, there has been a tremendous amount of justifiable venom being spewed at the CEOs of these firms. Their ignorance, and in some cases their arrogance, allowed these rogue CEOs to operate outside of normal business rules, conduct self-serving agendas, and partake in self-dealing transactions all while receiving outrageous compensation. Before I go any further, let me state that I believe we should understand that the overwhelming majority of CEOs operate within the bounds of reason and ethics consistently placing stakeholder interests ahead of their own. The real question we should be asking…
Hotel Brokers International Sells 10,000th Property
Hotel Brokers International has brokered its 10,000th hotel transaction. The milestone was a $10.2 million package deal of two Holiday Inn Express hotels. The two properties were a 77-unit Holiday Inn Express in Austinburg, Ohio, which sold for $5.6 million, and the 64-unit Holiday Inn Express in Newton Falls, Ohio, which sold for $4.4 million. It was appropriate that HBI achieved the milestone with two mid-market hotels, since that is the lion’s share of transactions the brokerage network completes, H. Brandt Niehaus (pictured), president of HBI and the Louisville, Ky.-based brokerage, Huff, Niehaus & Associates, told CPN at the 2008…
Debate to Go On Tonight, Reid Says Bailout Vote Possible by Monday
Just before noon EST today, it was announced that the debate between presidential candidates Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. John McCain will indeed go forward tonight as planned at the University of Mississippi. The debate had been in danger of being canceled as Washington legislators focus on keeping the nation’s financial system, and perhaps the economy as a whole, from collapsing. McCain agreed to the debate and at presstime was about to leave Washington on his way to Oxford, Miss. Meanwhile, mixed messages were filtering out about Congressional efforts to hammer out a rescue plan. In a press conference at…
Behringer Harvard Acquires 500,000 SF Houston Office Tower
Just two weeks after Hurricane Ike blew through Houston, Dallas-based Behringer Harvard has acquired One BriarLake Plaza, a 20-story tower with more than 500,000 square feet of office space there, for an undisclosed amount. Prior to closing, an initial assessment of the effect of Hurricane Ike on One BriarLake Plaza (pictured) indicated only minor damage to windows and landscaping. Tenants resumed normal business operations at the property on Sept. 16. Built in 2000 on more than nine acres along the Sam Houston Parkway in west Houston, the site provides access to Interstate 10 to the north and the Westpark Tollway…