PEORIA, AZ-A local real estate investment company next year will launch its first ground-up development on 15.9 acres of industrial-zoned land at the corner of Loop 101 and Peoria Avenue.

Presson Corp. of Phoenix will build a speculative three-building, 182,000-sf complex with warehouse, showroom and office space. Presson paid $3.1 million for the land, which it acquired from Wood McCaslin II LLC, a group of three Phoenix individuals known for buying and selling vacant property. That group had held the ground waiting for the right opportunity to sell it to a developer once more freeway infrastructure went in around this part of the city, Bruce Campbell with CB Richard Ellis Inc.'s Phoenix office tells GlobeSt.com. He represented buyer and seller in the transaction.

The land was on the market "for awhile," Campbell says, "but Presson was very interested in buying it and the sellers were glad to sell it to them. Presson is trying to capitalize on the growth of the West Valley and also on the freeway frontage so it's a great piece to be developing."

No figures were available on the total construction cost of Loop 101 Commerce Center or its financing. According to Campbell, Presson owns about five million sf of industrial and office space in the local market and Tucson. In fact, it was the lure of the freeway frontage along the Loop 101 and the fast-growing area that led Presson to consider its first development. "They just fell in love with the property," Campbell says. "They are just very excited about it."

Campbell says the developer anticipates starting construction in early 2005 and finishing about midyear. The three buildings will consist of 52,000 sf, 40,000 sf and 90,000 sf, all facing the freeway. That highway access is a key part of the project because the land features two full-diamond Loop 101 interchanges at Olive and Peoria avenues, one each at the property's north and south end. The property also has frontage on 91st Avenue, a major north-south thoroughfare running parallel to the freeway. The location is spurring Presson to seek tenants for prominent showroom space as well as warehouse users.

Now is a good time for Presson to be building, even on a speculative basis, Campbell points out. The area's industrial market has been healthy despite the past few years' depressed economy, he explains, citing a vacancy of less than 9%.

Campbell says the buildings will rent for 80 cents per sf to $1 per sf triple net for three- to five-year terms as single and multi-tenant product. "We do have two or three tenants looking at it now," he says. "We are wide open as far as what kinds of tenants." Designed by local architect Patrick Hays, the Peoria project will be tilt-wall construction with "a lot of glass," Campbell notes, to further hammer home the showroom concept.