KKR Pays $250M for Two Industrial Properties in Phoenix, Atlanta

Palmetto Distribution Center. Image courtesy of Lee & Associates

Global investment firm KKR has acquired two newly constructed properties – an industrial park in Phoenix and a warehouse in the Atlanta market – in separate transactions for approximately $250 million.

The purchases were made through KKR Real Estate Partners Americas III, KKR’s Americas’ opportunistic equity real estate fund. The fund was closed in October 2021 with $4.3 billion dedicated to opportunistic real estate investments, primarily in the United States. Last May, KKR said the fund would also be used for ground-up industrial assets. The company’s wholly owned U.S. industrial real estate platform, Alpha Industrial Properties, was at that time developing four projects and had four more in development for a total of 1.8 million square feet in markets including Atlanta, Dallas, Denver and Orlando, Fla.

Across all its funds in the U.S., KKR has committed or acquired approximately $7.5 billion of logistics assets in the industrial sector since 2018 and currently owns more than 48 million square feet of industrial real estate in major U.S. metropolitan areas.

Expanding Footprints

The Arizona property at South 99^th Avenue and Buckeye Road in Tolleson consists of three Class A buildings totaling approximately 1.3 million square feet and is located in Phoenix’s Southwest Valley industrial market. Known as Go 99 South, the industrial park is situated near major transportation nodes including Interstate Highway 10 and Arizona State Route 101. KKR did not disclose the seller.

Other KKR industrial assets in the Phoenix region including 101 at Van Buren, a two-building, 633,321-square-foot Class A logistics property in Avondale, Ariz., that the firm acquired in August for nearly $92 million from Crow Holdings Capital, according to CommercialEdge.

The approximately 700,000-square-foot Class A warehouse in Georgia is located in Palmetto, an Atlanta industrial submarket, and is in close proximity to the CSX Fairburn Intermodal Terminal in Fairburn, Ga., and the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. CommercialEdge data states the 56.6-acre property is at 7965 Bowen Road and was developed by Becknell Industrial. Known as the Palmetto Distribution Center, the building was completed in 2022. Becknell received a $26.1 million loan from BMO Harris Bank in August 2021 for the building, according to CommercialEdge data. The same source reports that the property is subject to a 13-year unsubordinated net ground lease held by the Development Authority of Fulton County through Dec. 31, 2024.

Lee & Associates, which represented Becknell in marketing the site, stated at the time of the land purchase in August 2021 the distribution facility would be a cross-docked building with a 40-foot minimum clear height, ample care and on-site trailer parking, ESFR sprinkler systems, LED lighting with motion sensors and sufficient dock packages.

Ben Brudney, a director in KKR’s real estate group, said in a prepared statement the firm was pleased to be expanding its industrial footprint in both markets, which continue to have attractive growth fundamentals including positive demographic and onshoring manufacturing trends. Brudney added they are seeing resilient demand for high-quality, well- located industrial products and they believe that despite near-term supply headwinds, industrial supply and demand fundamentals will remain attractive in the medium to long term.