Investors Are Returning to Phoenix With a New Strategy

Some investors are returning to Phoenix with a different strategy. Investors that once focused on value-add deals in the market are now seeing more core opportunities. While that isn’t to say that value-add deals and investors aren’t still active in the market—which they are—it shows the evolution of Phoenix to appeal to core and institutional capital and long-term hold investors.

LaSalle Investment Management is one such investor. The firm, which operates a number of open- and closed-ended funds with different investment goals, recently purchased a renovated multifamily property in the South Phoenix neighborhood of Ahwatukee Foothills. The property, San Melia, a 488-unit multifamily complex, is the investor’s only multifamily asset in the market since exiting out of a handful of value-add multifamily deals a few years ago. “We have owned in the market in the past, but we don’t own multifamily in the market outside of this asset,” Summit Walia, managing director of acquisitions at LaSalle, tells GlobeSt.com. “However, we continue to look for interesting transactions in the market.”

While the firm is returning to Phoenix with this core multifamily buy, it doesn’t look in specific markets for deals—although it does like the fundamentals of Phoenix. Rather, it looks for opportunities that check certain investment boxes. The Ahwatukee property was a perfect fit. “We don’t have any specific goals for investment in any market, including Phoenix,” says Walia. “We pursue selective assets that meet our investment objectives. When this asset came up, it checked a lot of the boxes that we are looking for. Assuming that other assets in the market fit our investment goals, we will continue to pursue those assets, either marketed or on an off-market basis.”

Earlier in the cycle, LaSalle owned value-add multifamily properties in the market. “The last few deals that we have done in the market have been more value-add in nature. We sold those when we completed the business plan. It really had nothing to do with timing the market cycle,” says Walia. In addition, the firm also owns commercial assets in Phoenix, including retail.

For the Ahwatukee purchase, LaSalle plans to hold the property for the long term. “For this asset, it is a long term investment,” says Walia. “We will not try to time the market, but we will hold through cycles. We view this specific location and this specific asset as something that will produce long-term cash flow.”

Phoenix has shown a lot of growth in the last several years, and as more institutional core buyers find deals and enter the market for the long term, Phoenix is well on it’s way to becoming a market akin to Portland and Denver.