Industrial Park Upgrades Planned New Owner Plans New Roof, Roads, Landscaping
Tenants of the 50-year-old Spokane Business and Industrial Park in the Valley will receive $6 million in building and street improvements under new ownership announced Monday.
But they also may pay higher rents in the future.
Crown West Realty, a newly formed Spokane-based real estate investment company, said it bought Spokane County’s largest industrial park last Friday from a unit of the Washington Water Power Co.
Terms of the deal, which has been in the works for nine months, were not disclosed.
However, Pentzer Development Corp., a subsidiary of Pentzer Corp. and WWP, last year advertised the 405-acre park near Sullivan and Trent at a price of $53 million.
“We’re thrilled with the enthusiasm and commitment the new ownership brings to Spokane,” said Richard Rollnick, who left the top post at Pentzer Development to become president of Crown West.
About 4,500 people work at the park, including employees of Key Tronic Corp. and Boise Cascade Corp. The park is one of the county’s largest taxpayers, generating $702,000 in annual property taxes.
Crown West is controlled by Petrus Partners, a New York City investment group that wants to expand its real estate holdings into the West, Rollnick said. Petrus Partners also is a financial backer of Civilization magazine, according to the New York Times.
Crown West will spend $6 million during the next three years to replace roofs, pave roads, paint buildings and landscape common areas at the park.
Existing tenants will see no immediately increase in rental rates, Rollnick said, but rates may rise in the future as demand increases.
With more than 4 million square feet of space, the park controls half of the county’s industrial space. It is 95 percent occupied with in excess of 100 tenants.
Some longtime tenants pay 17 cents a square foot per month, half what a new industrial building would cost, said Dave Black, chief executive officer of Tomlinson Black Commercial Real Estate Co.
“Whoever owns that park has a significant influence on industrial rental rates in Spokane County,” said Black, who assisted the Grubb & Ellis Co. office in Anaheim, Calif., in the sale.
Richard Davis, president of Pentzer Corp., a non-utility arm of WWP, said the company sold the park to free up capital it wanted to invest in various companies to diversify its holdings. Pentzer, which last year bought a Memphis retail display business and a California electronic-component maker, has another acquisition in the works that may be announced this month, he said.
The industrial park originally was built in the 1940s as a naval depot. Since 1980, 12 newer buildings have been added and the park has 60 undeveloped acres.
The Crown West purchase does not include the adjoining Euclid Building, a new 22,800-square-foot project, Rollnick said. An investor, which Rollnick would not name, has signed a letter-of-intent to buy the building.
, DataTimes