Stonelake Buys 3.1M SF Industrial Portfolio

Stonelake Opportunity Partners III LP, a fund managed by Dallas-based private equity firm Stonelake Capital Partners, has purchased 35 industrial buildings in Dallas, Houston and San Antonio, assembling a $200 million Texas industrial portfolio. Stonelake assembled the industrial portfolio through 11 separate deals over the last 18 months without an operating partner, according to a BizNow report. The 3.1 million square foot portfolio will be the final investment for Stonelake's fund; the company will manage the portfolio in-house to boost the buildings' occupancy and rental rates.

Stonelake said it plans to continue acquiring 50,000-150,000 square foot industrial buildings. According to a Dallas Business Journal report, Stonelake plans to hold the properties for the next three to five years. In Dallas-Fort Worth, the portfolio includes nearly 1.3 million square feet in Valwood, the Great Southwest and the Turnpike submarkets. In Houston, Stonelake has more than 1 million square feet of industrial space. In San Antonio. the firm has acquired more than 750,000 square feet of space. The company — founded in 2007 — has over $2 billion of commercial real estate throughout Texas.

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Liberty Property Trust Buys Cabot Industrial Portfolio for $1.5B

Liberty Property Trust, a Pennsylvania-based industrial landlord, announced this week that it had entered into an agreement to buy the operating partnership of Cabot Industrial Value Fund III for $1.475 billion. The purchase price consists of the assumption of approximately $230 million of outstanding mortgage debt with a weighted average maturity of seven years with the remainder payable in cash. Liberty, which currently owns 662 properties, said it will fund the deal with a combination of real estate sales, debt and equity financing, according to a Businessweek article. The company also announced that it plans to sell 21 million shares.

"With approximately 58% of this portfolio located in Liberty's current markets and approximately 21% in the target markets of Atlanta, Dallas and Southern California, we are expanding into three of the top five national industrial markets," William Hankowsky, chief executive officer of Liberty, said in a statement.

Expected to close in October of 2013, the transaction will increase Liberty's industrial platform by approximately 23 million square feet and will add 177 properties in 24 new and existing Liberty industrial markets. Of the total portfolio, approximately 13 million square feet are located in 14 of Liberty's existing 15 industrial markets, including Chicago, South Florida, Houston, New Jersey, Maryland and Central Pennsylvania.

For more news and information visit Blumberg Capital Partners.

$13.8M Sale-Leaseback for Industrial Properties

American Forest Products has sold a portfolio of industrial properties located in California, South Carolina and Virginia to a private equity fund for $13.8 million. Under the terms of the sale, coordinated by Stan Johnson Company's New York office, AFP agreed to a lease term of twenty-one (21) years as the single tenant within each property under an absolute net, master lease. The portfolio included 5 industrial properties, totaling roughly 575,000 square-feet.

"Every detail of the sale leaseback had to be specially managed to create a strong growth path for American Forest Products," said Camille Renshaw of Stan Johnson Company. "Ultimately, the seller was able to pay off debt and expand its credit revolvers for immediate and expansive new business growth."

The deal also provides tax advantages for AFP in leasing back the properties, she said. After five years, American Forest Products has the option to buy the land back, according to a Sacramento Business Journal article.

American Forest Products is the leading provider of third-party logistics and retail services, in conjunction with the sale of moulding and specialty millwork, into big-box retail and pro-dealer locations, such as Home Depot.

For more news and information visit Blumberg Capital Partners.

Westcore Properties Closes $600M Square Foot Industrial Portfolio

In a joint venture with a fund managed by DRA Advisors, a New York-based investment advisor, Westcore Properties has added more than 24 million square feet to its U.S. commercial real estate holdings with the purchase of an industrial portfolio from the Joe Benvenuti Company. The 110 buildings acquired by Westcore and DRA in the transaction include 8.0 million square feet in Sacramento, as well as 1.9 million square feet in St. Louis and 1.0 million square feet in Indianapolis. The sale followed the death of Joe Benvenuti earlier this year in May and was made by JB Properties. Jones Lang LaSalle's Sacramento office represented both sides in the transaction and said it was the largest industrial real estate acquisition in California this year and the second largest nationally, according to a San Diego Union-Tribune article.

"We have been long- term believers in industrial markets supported by ports and agri-business, which has led us to invest heavily in greater San Francisco as well as the San Joaquin and Central Valley areas of Northern California," said Marc Brutten, Chairman and Founder of Westcore Properties. "This acquisition gives us a strong foothold in Sacramento, a stabilizing market that has an outstanding distribution and transportation network."

"DRA has always been an active investor in industrial space, typically acquiring individual, value-added opportunities," said David Luski, President of DRA Advisors. "We are pleased to have made two larger portfolio acquisitions in the sector this year, as we like the cash flow attributes and opportunity to add value operationally, while benefiting from improving market conditions."

For more news and information visit Blumberg Capital Partners.

Gramercy Capital Buys Industrial Portfolio for $27.1M

Gramercy Capital Corp., a self-managed, integrated commercial real estate investment and asset management company, announced this week that it had acquired a two-building 540,000 square foot industrial portfolio located in the Indianapolis metropolitan area for $27.125 million. Gramercy originally disclosed its intent to purchase the portfolio in the company's third quarter 2012 financial results report early in November. Terms of the deal were not disclosed (though it was noted that this was an all-cash transaction), and the exact location of the properties has not been listed, but the 3Q report indicated that the portfolio was 100% leased to three credit tenants, including Nestle Waters and Stanley Security Systems, with a 10.2-year weighted average lease term.

Gordon F. DuGan, Chief Executive Officer of Gramercy Capital Corp., commented, "This is our first closing under the Company's new strategy and represents an important step in the transformation of Gramercy into a premiere net lease investor focused on office and industrial properties." Mr. DuGan continued, "We are looking to construct a portfolio of high quality assets that generate durable sustainable cash flows for the benefit of our shareholders."

For more news and information visit Blumberg Capital Partners.