Realty Income Corp. Buys Orlando Industrial Building for $71M

3102 Shelby Industrial Drive. Image courtesy of JLL

Realty Income Corp., a San Diego-based REIT that invests in single-tenant commercial properties, has acquired a newly built 289,839-square-foot Class A industrial property near Orlando in Apopka, Fla., for little over $71.4 million from BlueScope Properties Group. Completed in July, the building at 3102 Shelby Industrial Drive is fully leased by The Coca-Cola Co.

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JLL marketed the property on behalf of BlueScope and brokered the long-term, net-lease build-to-suit agreement with the tenant.

The distribution center is situated on 21.2 acres within the 180-acre Mid-Florida Logistics Park, which is home to several other corporate users. The property is on the arterial State Route 429, which provides alternative access to the entire Orlando MSA. When the nearby Beltway project is completed, connectivity to the region from the site will increase. The North Orange County industrial submarket is one of the fastest-growing markets in Florida and has a deep labor pool. BlueScope also owns The Park @429, a 613,400-square-foot industrial development in the Ocoee/Winter Green submarket of Orlando.

The Apopka building includes 10 dry-dock doors with full equipment, 36-foot clear heights, ESFR sprinklers, LED lighting, cold storage space with capacity for 6,200 pallets, five cold dock doors to allow minimal temperature loss during handling and ample parking. The sale included an adjacent land parcel that would allow for future expansion of as much as 90,000 square feet.

JLL Capital Markets Managing Director Sean Devaney said in a prepared statement the asset drew attention from both foreign and domestic investors. He said interest in the property was extremely strong because of the long-term investment-grade tenant with an iconic brand name and growing demand for cold storage space. Devaney added that the favorable debt markets helped drive the market-leading pricing.

In addition to Devaney, the JLL Capital Markets team was led by Senior Managing Director John Huguenard and Managing Directors Julia Silva and Luis Castillo. Senior Director Brian Walsh and Senior Managing Director Keith Largay provided debt support. The JLL Agency Leasing team that secured the tenant for BlueScope was led by Managing Directors Wilson McDowell, Matt Sullivan and Bobby Isola.

Realty Income deals

Also in recent weeks, Realty Income paid more than $40 million to purchase the 132,449-square-foot McDonalds’ Distribution Center in Garner, N.C., according to the Triangle Business Journal. Most of Realty Income’s portfolio—84.6 percent—is retail assets. As of Sept. 30, the REIT owned 119 industrial properties, representing 10.4 percent of the portfolio. For non-retail properties, the REIT targets primarily industrial and distribution properties leased to Fortune 1000, investment-grade companies.

In September, Realty Income acquired a 103,000-square-foot, single-tenant retail property occupied by a Wegmans supermarket in Cary, N.C., for $34.8 million from Leyland Twin Lakes LLC, an affiliate of LeylandAlliance. JLL Capital Markets marketed that property on behalf of the seller. The Wegmans parcel is within the Twin Lakes Center, a 35-acre mixed-use project.