PHOENIX-Making its first investment since closing its US Office Value Added Venture II Fund (VAV III), Hines bought the 302,209-square-foot 24^th at Camelback I for $81 million. The seller was Germany's GLL Real Estate Partners, which has owned the class A office building since 2006.

The building, designed by Pickard Chilton, was developed by Hines and completed in 2000. Since its completion, Hines has managed the property, which is situated on 8.5 acres on 24^th Street and Camelback Road. 24th at Camelback I has received LEED® Gold designation, nine ENERGY STAR® labels, and was awarded the TOBY Award in 2011 for BOMA's Greater Phoenix Office Building of the Year.

Notes Hines Senior Managing Director and fund manager Dave Congdon in a press release, "We are very pleased with the acquisition of such a high-quality building in Phoenix's Camelback Corridor. This asset is well positioned to capitalize on the continued recovery in the Greater Phoenix market."

Hines Managing Director Travis Overall adds, in the same release, "The Camelback corridor is a premier office location in Phoenix, and this acquisition capitalizes on the strength of the Hines firm: strong local teams of real estate experts in key markets who have long track records of buying, developing, leasing and operating office projects."

The seller also weighed in, noting "we are very pleased with our investment experience with this asset," comments GLL's Christopher Quiett. "I think we had a significant impact on both the building and in operations during our stewardship, and we anticipate that companies located at 24th at Camelback will see even more positive impacts under Hines' ownership. They are an excellent company."

VAV III closed in August 2012 and is capitalized with $210 million of equity for more than $600 million of total leveraged capacity in the U.S. office sector. VAV III targets investments through which the firm can create value through leasing, management or redevelopment activities.

GLL Real Estate Partners also made recent headlines with its buy of the 159,764-square-foot Papago Spectrumat 1225 W. Washington, on which an update will be posted shortly.