High Barrier-to-Entry Characteristics Propel Portland
The partnership of Bridge Development Partners LLC announced its first acquisition in the Portland market, with the purchase of a 35-acre land parcel located at 775 NE Columbia Blvd.
PORTLAND, OR—Citing Portland’s sought-after industrial market with high barriers to entry, one partnership finally cracked the code to its first acquisition here. The partnership of Bridge Development Partners LLC announced its first acquisition in the Portland market with the purchase of a 35-acre land parcel located at 775 NE Columbia Blvd.
Bridge plans to construct two new industrial buildings at the site, which will be called Bridge Point I-5–Portland, expected to deliver in late 2020. The first building will be comprised of approximately 425,000 square feet and the second will be comprised of approximately 225,000 square feet.
During the due diligence period, Bridge worked through environmental concerns of the former landfill site, which was a complex process involving environmental, land and zoning use issues, in less than 90 days.
“Located on what was a complicated but exceptionally well-located site just outside of Portland’s central business district, this project is ideally aligned with Bridge’s core competencies and it presented us with the perfect opportunity to break into this new market,” said Justin Carlucci, partner, Northwest Region at Bridge Development. “Additionally, the site’s heavy industrial zoning, coupled with the surplus of parking that it will offer, enables use by a variety of distribution tenant types with a wide range of size requirements.”
The 425,000-square-foot building has been designed with a 36-foot clear height and 100 trailer stalls, ideally accommodating distribution-oriented tenants in the 150,000- to 425,000-square-foot range. The 225,000-square-foot building has been designed with a 32-foot clear height and 36 trailer stalls, tailored to distribution, manufacturing and other industrial tenants with requirements as small as 20,000 square feet.
“One year ago, we opened the Northwest office and started doing deals in Seattle and Portland. Prior to that, we were not pursuing projects in those cities but we always knew we wanted to be here,” Carlucci tells GlobeS.com. “Portland’s a popular industrial market is one of the most sought-after and highest barrier-to-entry markets. Our goal is to find unique industrial properties in the best industrial markets. This property is one of the best-located properties we’ve seen in quite some time, in fact, one of the most unique and well-positioned properties to come along in decades.”
Bridge Point I-5–Portland is located within 1.5 miles of two separate interchanges onto Interstate 5 and less than 7 miles from Portland’s central business district. The site also offers access to Portland International Airport within minutes and other major interstates that serve the broader region.
Brian Mitchell of Macadam Forbes represented the seller, Hanson Pipe, in the transaction. Tom Talbot, Karla Hansen and Zach Francis of Kidder Mathews represented the partnership of Bridge Development Partners in the acquisition.
“We are pleased to represent Bridge Development on this strategic acquisition of Bridge Point I-5–Portland,” says Talbot. “This complicated project would not have been possible had it not been for Bridge’s ability to solve problems quickly.”
The overall Portland industrial vacancy rate hit an all-time low of 3% in the fourth quarter of 2018, almost half the average quarterly nine year figure of 5.7%, according to a report by Cushman & Wakefield. Vacancy has now fallen by 430 basis points during the past five years. Fueled by high demand and a limited supply of available land, due in large part to Portland’s urban growth boundary, vacancy will remain at low levels. Tenants have now begun searching for locations on the outskirts of the traditional core as long as there is access to a primary transit corridor, preferably Interstate 5. Two areas currently on the radar of industrial developers and occupiers are Canby, Woodburn and Salem, with large parcels available. In 2018, 3.9 million square feet of new inventory was delivered to the Portland industrial market with 500,000 square feet in the fourth quarter alone, says Cushman & Wakefield.