CIT Bank, BlackRock Originate $163M Loan Package for Industrial Portfolio

6999 Alamo Downs Parkway, San Antonio. Image via Google Street View

The Arden Group is the recipient of a two-part, $163 million loan package from CIT Bank and BlackRock to help it assemble a 2.1-million-square-foot, 12-property industrial portfolio across multiple states.

Both the $134.3 million senior loan from CIT and the approximately $29.2 million in mezzanine debt from BlackRock carry floating rates. The debt covers Arden’s $96 million purchase of 10 assets from Avistone LLC, as well as a recapitalization of two sizable industrial properties that Arden purchased about 18 months ago.  

Newmark Knight Frank’s Dustin Stolly and Jordan Roeschlaub arranged the transaction, along with Chris Kramer, Nick Scribani and Shervin Tork. In a prepared statement, NKF described the properties as well spread out across six industrial markets nationwide and almost 90 percent leased to more than 300 diverse tenants.

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The financing package replaces previous CMBS debt on the 10 Avistone assets, which are located in San Antonio, Dallas, Atlanta and Columbus, Ohio, and previous bridge debt on two separate industrial properties in Philadelphia and Charlotte, N.C.

Arden bought a 608,000-square-foot industrial building in Lower Bucks County, Pa., near Philadelphia, in August 2018 for about $44.9 million. In November of that year, it purchased for $38.3 million the 393,357-square-foot Coffee Creek Industrial Business Center in Charlotte.

The former Avistone portfolio includes Creek Run Commerce Center at 460-480 Schrock Road in Columbus and West Tech Business Center at 6901-6999 Alamo Downs Parkway in San Antonio.

Tall and Wide

In a very different acquisition almost exactly a year ago, Arden and partners Silverstein Properties and Migdal Insurance bought 1735 Market St., a 54-story Class A office tower in Philadelphia, for $452 million.

Nationally, the industrial space market remains in growth mode, with about $91.7 billion in sales volume in 2019, an increase of about 17 percent over the previous year, according to a fourth-quarter report from NKF. “Investor confidence remains high, as low vacancy, strong rent growth and a paucity of modern distribution facilities continue to drive robust investment in industrial assets. As gateway markets seeing pricing rise, investors are allocating funds to emerging markets with accelerating demand,” the report states.