the Editors of Commercial Property Executive
inVentiv Health Signs 154,000-SF Lease in New Jersey
inVentiv Health, a provider of commercialization services to the global pharmaceutical and healthcare industries, has signed a 154,000-square-foot lease at Atrium Corporate Park (pictured) in Somerset, N.J. The four-building complex contains 900,000 square feet of Class A office space along with amenities including a conference center, fitness center, full-service hotel and banquet facilities, and nearby daycare centers, restaurants, hotels and shopping.The relocation to 500 Atrium Drive will enable inVentiv Health to consolidate four office locations in New Jersey.”The move to a new headquarters is very consistent with our overall business strategy,” said Terrell Herring, president & COO of inVentiv Health….
Financial Industry Woes Drag Market Down
Banks were back in the spotlight again Monday, and not for pleasant reasons, as they helped to drive the equity markets downward. Citigroup led the downward charge, losing about 17 percent of its value. Investors seemed worried about the banking giant’s continued and seemingly unquenchable thirst for capital, as well as uncertainty about who’s going to be running the place once an opaque management reshuffling is complete.All together, the Down Jones Industrial Average was down 125.21 points, or about 1.46 percent. The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq lost more: 2.26 percent and 2.09 percent respectively. Attention also focused on banks…
Candy Manufacturer Leases Largest Spec Warehouse Ever in Texas
Flying in the face of a downtrodden industrial market, the biggest spec warehouse building ever to grace the state of Texas has found a tenant to occupy the facility in its entirety. Candy manufacturer Farley’s & Sathers has signed on to occupy Duke Realty’s Grand Lakes II (pictured), a 1 million-square-foot structure off I-30 in Grand Prairie, approximately 15 miles west of Dallas. Having signed a long-term lease with Duke, Farley’s will relocate operations from two facilities totaling about 500,000 square feet in neighboring Arlington to the year-old Grand Lakes II in March. Carrying the address of 3953 Gifford St.,…
Clarett Group Buys FountainGlen
The Clarett Group acquired FountainGlen Portfolio Management Inc., a developer and operator of age-restricted residential communities located in California cities such as Huntington Beach, Pasadena, Anaheim Hills and Valencia.The firm’s existing portfolio of managed properties includes 10 communities that were developed under the FountainGlen banner which were sold in 2006 to an institutional investment partnership. To date, the company has developed 12 communities totaling approximately 2,650 units. “We believe that high-quality rental age-restricted housing will continue to be an increasingly important segment of the real estate market,” said Veronica Hackett, managing partner of The Clarett Group. “FountainGlen has created the…
San Antonio Office Market Maintains Steady Pace with Job Growth
While office markets around the country spiral downward, the San Antonio market suffered less than its counterparts nationwide. The leasing market wrapped up the year with significantly lower absorption growth in comparison to 2007, but those were some hard numbers to follow, according to Grubb & Ellis Co.’s 2009 forecast for San Antonio’s office and investment markets. The large amount of space absorbed in 2006 and 2007 sparked a frenzy of new construction activity in the market of which 1.2 million square feet was added in 2008. Sensitive to the economic conditions, speculative development will taper off significantly to approximately…
Markets Unnerved by Unemployment
Unemployment was up at the end of last week and investors didn’t seem to like that, sending the Dow Jones index down on Friday by 143.28 points, or about 1.64 percent. The S&P 500 lost even more ground, 2.13 percent, as did the Nasdaq, which was down 2.81 percent. Now that December’s job-loss numbers from the U.S. Department of Labor are in–524,000 during the last month of the year–it seems a grand total of 2.6 million Americans lost their jobs during 2008. A good many headlines blared that the last time job loss numbers were that bad was in 1945,…
Will DSTs Gain Momentum During Credit Crunch?
The credit crunch that has gripped the U.S. and the world during the last 18 months seems to be giving momentum to a property investment vehicle, the Delaware Statutory Trust (DST), that allows as many as 100 investors, and sometimes more, to buy commercial real estate and reap the benefits of a 1031 exchange. Many tenant-in-common, or TIC, sponsors are increasingly turning to the DST model to buy properties, according to Grant Conness (pictured), president of 1031 Alternatives Group, L.L.C. “We’ve seen an uptick in this (DST) activity,” Conness told CPN, and today’s capital constrained environment is the major reason…
Despite Low Confidence, CRE Investors Plan Portfolio Increases
Although there is no end in sight to the economy’s downward spiral, many commercial real estate investors think this year will be a good time to do some shopping. Of the 1,129 private and institutional real estate investors queried in a Marcus & Millichap Real Estate Investment Services survey, 51 percent plan to increase the size of their portfolios in 2009. While the figure plummeted from last year, when 62 percent expected to make acquisitions, it is still an indication that the industry is not sounding the alarm just yet. Right now, the same challenges remain. Sixty-one percent of the…
ProLogis Leases 237,000 SF in Poland
ProLogis has signed new lease agreements for approximately 237,000 square feet of warehouse space at two ProLogis parks located near Wroclaw, Poland.Sonoco Poland-Packaging Services has leased 118,000 square feet of space at ProLogis Park Wroclaw III. The park is located near the Wroclaw-Strachowice international airport.”We selected ProLogis Park Wroclaw III for its strategic location and modern building design,” said Gerson Heiderich, division vice president of operations at Sonoco Poland-Packaging Services. “Our new facility meets our high expectations and will support the continued growth of our operations in Poland.”Moreover, Polish footwear manufacturer and retailer NG2 S.A. has leased 117,000 square feet…
December Retail Sales Take Expected Dive
The equity markets bounced on Thursday like a ping pong ball. In the case of the Dow Jones, the index ended up nearly where it started, down only 27.24 points, or 0.31 percent. The S&P 500 managed to venture into positive territory, up 0.34 percent, and the Nasdaq did even better, gaining 1.12 percent.President-elect Barack Obama made his case early in the day for a multi-billion-dollar stimulus package that he can sign as soon as he takes office. At least he’s thinking big. No word from Congress yet on just how big its ideas will be in the coming weeks…