ORLANDO-After a year of scouting the Central Florida industrial market, Framingham, MA-based Staples Inc. has signed an estimated 10-year-lease for 555,000 sf at the former $20-million Toys 'R' Us high-tech warehouse. The property is owned by Massachusetts-based Equity Industrial Ltd. in Airport International Park of Orlando.
Staples principals couldn't be reached by GlobeSt.com's deadline to learn the length and value of the lease. However, Orlando industrial brokers who have done deals at AIPO, and are familiar with the 12-year-old Toys 'R' Us warehouse property, tell GlobeSt.com the lease was probably for a minimum 10 years at an effective rent of $4 per sf. That would put the lease in the $22-million value category, brokers tell GlobeSt.com.
Advantis GVA research shows average asking bulk warehouse rates in the Airport/Southeast industrial market at $3.76 per sf; flex space at $8.04 per sf; and office/warehouse space at $5.87 per sf. The average asking rent in the Airport/Southeast submarket is $5.39 per sf.
Toys 'R' Us and its 150 employees vacated the warehouse in 2000 when the Wayne, NJ-based company restructured itself and consolidated several divisions. The property has been vacant since.
David Murphy of CB Richard Ellis Inc.'s Orlando office and David Ginther of Dallas-based Fischer & Co. co-brokered the leasing transaction. Metro Orlando Economic Development Commission sources say they helped Staples find the property. In doing so, Orlando beat out Lakeland, Tampa, Miami and Jacksonville in signing the tenant, brokerage sources familiar with the deal tell GlobeSt.com.
"This lease represents one of the largest industrial leases in Central Florida in the past 10 years," Murphy tells GlobeSt.com. "It is clearly a sign that the Orlando industrial market is emerging as a statewide distribution center for Florida." He adds, "There are few blocks of industrial space over 100,000 sf in the market, and with demand outstripping supply, we expect to see significant market rate increases for bulk distribution space in 2006."
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