Research Park Goes All In On Upgrades
The Research Park at Marina Village is minutes from downtown Oakland and BART, and with 1 million square feet of product, it is big enough to give tenants the opportunity to expand.
ALAMEDA, CA—New ownership at Marina Village, the 1 million-square-foot office/research park on Alameda’s waterfront, means new amenities and other enhancements are on the way for both existing and prospective tenants. A fund controlled by DRA Advisors LLC, in joint venture with Local Capital Group, closed on the portfolio acquisition for a reported $265 million.
One of its first moves was to engage JLL to handle leasing at the 27-building office and research park. JLL’s Sam Swan, Grant Yeatman and Scott Miller lead the team leasing on the property, which is looking to convert much of the available vacancy to top-tier life science and research space.
“The Research Park at Marina Village is a high-quality location minutes from downtown Oakland and BART. With 1 million square feet of product, it is big enough to give tenants the opportunity to expand in a thoughtfully planned research park located at the geographic center of the San Francisco Bay Area,” said Swan.
The project has more than 300,000 square feet of dedicated life science and research space. With 200,000 square feet of direct vacancy deliverables today, vacant space is being redesigned to accommodate lab users.
Vacant suites range from 5,000 square feet to more than 40,000 square feet for a full-building user with the ability to create a campus environment. This new inventory will be welcome news to life sciences firms throughout the region, as growing tenants struggle to find viable options to develop research space.
“Ownership is committed to supporting tenants with programs to deliver new amenities as we transform Marina Village. The incentives, competitive lease structures and innovative first tier life science space will be compelling for both growing tenants and their brokers,” said Dan Poritzky, partner of Local Capital Group.
The Research Park at Marina Village is a 60-acre office park set within a 200-acre master-planned community on the waterfront in Alameda, less than 15 minutes from Oakland International Airport. The 12th Street BART station and San Francisco-Alameda Ferry provide public transportation access to the development, which is surrounded by shopping and retail amenities.
“We look forward to working with the city of Alameda, the existing tenant base and new companies to add life to the 27-building waterfront campus,” Poritzky tells GlobeSt.com. “We have a specific plan to bring class-A life science to the single-story buildings. There is limited supply and we can accommodate users ranging from 5,000 to 40,000 square feet through our 200,000 square feet of existing vacancy. We are in the process of assembling a seasoned team of life science architects, contractors, brokers and vendors to help us create this cluster of biotech firms.”
Local Capital Group was founded in 2013 by John Bickford and Josh Corzine. The company’s initial focus was residential and mixed-use development in urban core locations.
“We expanded into the commercial market with our first portfolio acquisition in 2017,” Bickford, co-founder and managing partner of Local Capital Group, tells GlobeSt.com. “One common theme through acquiring $850,000 of assets to date is to work with people we know and real estate we are familiar with. As Local continues to strategically grow, so does our team with the addition of veterans and future stars who share our vision.”
Office tenants in the market continue to be lured by East Bay asking rates and vacancy levels, according to an office report by Colliers International. Additionally, tenants in the market increasingly view Oakland’s infrastructure, jobs, public transit options and local amenities as checking all the boxes at a meaningful discount to the San Francisco market’s record-high rental rates.