Partners Capital Buys Industrial Asset in 1031 Exchange

By Ariela Moraru

535 E. Tennis Court Lane, San Bernardino, Calif.

Partners Capital acquired a 92,000-square-foot industrial building in San Bernardino, Calif., from Savvy Intellect LLC for nearly $8.7 million. The building is fully leased to New York-based auto parts distributor Parts Authority and serves as its West Coast distribution hub.

Located at 535 E. Tennis Court Lane, the property has direct access to interstates 215, 15 and 10. Corporate neighbors include the warehouses and distribution centers of Amazon, Kohl’s, Pep Boys, Stater Brothers, Mattell, Pepsi Co., Pactiv, Kohler and Burlington Coat Factory. Remington Moses, a principal of Lee and Associates in the firm’s Gardena office, represented Partners Capital in the transaction, while Guss Andros, executive vice president in Daum Commercial’s Ontario office, worked on behalf of the seller.

Go small

Partners Capital acquired the property as part of a 1031 exchange, following the disposition of two brick-and-mortar retail assets in San Francisco and Las Vegas. This marks the sixth industrial acquisition over the past 18 months for the company, which targets buildings under 200,000 square feet in Southern California. Investment in industrial properties represents a strategic retail play for Partners Capital, according to Vice President of Acquisitions Mark Blumenthal. He noted that, since Millennials who tend to shop online begin to outnumber baby boomers, the e-commerce boom will fuel demand for well-located distribution and fulfillment centers. This will help push industrial vacancy to record-low levels, according to the 2017 U.S. Industrial Midyear Outlook report from Marcus & Millichap.

“The market is extremely tight for small to mid-cap retailers who want to lease or own their own buildings,” said Bobby Khorshidi, president of Partners Capital, in a prepared statement.  “Much of the new inventory being built is targeting multi-national retailers with space requirements of 300,000 square feet or larger. This has created an attractive investment opportunity.”  

The vacancy rate for industrial properties in the Inland Empire has hit a record low of 3.8 percent in the second quarter, according to a Colliers report. The two-county area had the highest absorption in the Greater Los Angeles area at 4,696,500 square feet.

Image courtesy of Partners Capital