Bahrain-based alternative investment firm Arcapita and Arden Group, a US real estate investment company, have announced a joint venture to acquire multi-tenant industrial properties in urban centres across major markets in the United States.
The new venture closed on an initial portfolio of properties valued at over $550 million, with an additional $250 million of properties closing in the near term, a statement said.
Plans have also been announced to grow the portfolio to up to $2 billion in gross asset value across the top 25 US industrial markets.
The venture’s initial portfolio totals approximately five million square feet spread across 18 industrial parks, located in seven US markets – Atlanta, Charlotte, Columbus, Dallas, Houston, Philadelphia and Indianapolis.
Atif A Abdulmalik (pictured below), Arcapita CEO, said: “This joint venture is part of our broader industrial real estate strategy, having completed roughly $5.5 billion in industrial and logistics real estate transactions globally for nearly twenty years. We are pleased to partner with Arden and provide our investors with this highly diversified portfolio.”
“This niche industrial sector has been a thematic investment strategy for Arden and continues to provide attractive cash yields,” added Craig A Spencer, chairman and CEO of Arden Group.
The joint venture is targeting in-fill warehouses which have experienced very low new supply due to the limited availability of undeveloped land near urban centres.
With growing demand across the logistics spectrum, rent growth for the multi-tenant subsector is expected to continue. The joint venture’s technology-enabled operating platform aims to disrupt the decentralised, local ownership groups that characterise this asset class, the statement said.
“Infill industrial facilities are critical in the US supply chain and have become increasingly important given the acceleration of logistics and business services,” said Shike Goedar, president and chief investment officer of Arden Logistics Parks. “We intend to capitalise on strong US demand from a growing variety of tenants by providing institutional quality facilities in strategic locations.”
“The overall US industrial market is driven by powerful long-term tailwinds and sustained capital inflows, generating growing investor demand in the multi-tenant sub-sector,” added Brian Hebb, managing director and head of Arcapita’s US Real Estate team.
“The aggregation plans for this joint venture will allow us to build a sizeable market share within a highly fragmented sector. We look forward to combining Arcapita’s long-standing presence in global industrial real estate with Arden’s best-in-class management team to grow this platform over the long term.”
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