Faropoint Expands Atlanta Industrial Footprint
Faropoint has acquired two infill light-industrial properties in the metro Atlanta market, 48-50 Best Friend Road and 1056 Personal Place. Ivanhoé Cambridge sold the fully leased assets totaling about 253,500 square feet with the assistance of JLL.
MWD Logistics occupies the entire Personal Place property, while Currey & Co. fully leased the Best Friend Road location. Both companies are well-established in metro Atlanta and their respective sectors, according to JLL.
Both properties came online in the 1970s. The 90,000-square-foot Personal Place facility in Morrow, Ga., features a rear-load configuration, 22-foot clear heights and a 100-foot truck court. The larger Best Friend Road asset, at about 163,500 square feet in Doraville, Ga., sports a cross-dock load configuration, 30-foot clear heights, a 120-foot truck court with a 50-foot concrete apron and six rail doors.
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JLL Director Jim Freeman, together with Senior Managing Directors Matt Wirth, Dennis Mitchell and Britton Burdette, represented the seller.
“It’s a good time to sell these assets, and it’s a good time to buy these assets,” Wirth told Commercial Property Executive. “Demand for infill industrial properties remains very strong due to the high barriers to entry for new development to accommodate tenants of this size.”
That dynamic creates a larger buyer pool and a liquid market, Wirth added. The scenario is also favorable for the buyer, as it is able to anticipate a high likelihood of pushing rent at future rollover, while their downside risk is pretty well protected.
Faropoint’s portfolio growth
Faropoint has been adding to its portfolio with gusto recently, generally through off-market deals focused on acquiring infill assets in high-growth markets. In June, the company closed its Industrial Value Fund III with $915 million in commitments, well exceeding the $750 million target.
In fact, Faropoint is no stranger to Greater Atlanta. In May, the investor acquired 4600-4680 Lewis Road, a 220,380-square-foot, three-building campus in Stone Mountain, Ga. The company now has nearly 2.3 million square feet of industrial space in the market, according to CommercialEdge data.
Atlanta industrial market one of nation’s strongest
Industrial properties are very much in demand in Greater Atlanta, with net absorption for the first three quarters of 2024 totaling a positive 6.9 million square feet, according to a Colliers report. Scheduled move-ins will mean additional occupancy gains heading into 2025.
At the same time, industrial development, which has been heated in Atlanta in recent years, is finally slowing down, approaching the five-year pre-pandemic average of 19.7 million square feet, the same report shows.
The under-construction square footage, totaling 19.3 million, has dropped below 20 million square feet for the first time since 2018. Meanwhile, completions for 2024 thus far amounted to 19.4 million square feet, down 17.8 percent year-over-year.
Industrial rental rates in the Atlanta market increased 5.8 percent over the year at the end of the third quarter. And they are expected to continue to grow as supply-side pressure eases and steady demand persists across the metro.
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