Baltz paid in the ballpark of $6.7 million for the acreage at the southwest corner of 48th Street and McDowell Road. Shortly before, Fairfield paid $5.6 million to Ponderosa Manufactured Homes LLC of Scottsdale. Seller of record FF Realty LLC merely was recouping its investment in the property, which entailed a lengthy process of city approvals on zoning and site plans plus removal of an overlay on the mobile home park tract.
Fairfield's development plan was good, but Baltz's plan for a new middle school is better, Chaz Smith, first vice president of CB Richard Ellis' Phoenix office, tells GlobeSt.com. The property's configuration makes it a good school site, he explains. Besides, there is a high student population living in the immediate area. Smith says Fairfield is not shopping the area for another tract.
Smith and CB Richard Ellis' Susan Mendonca, marketing specialist, and John Finnegan, associate, brokered the land sale between Fairfield and the mobile home park seller. Culver White and Todd Sells, both of Russ Lyon Realty Co. in Phoenix, handled the sale between Fairfield and the school district.
The land is one mile from Tempe Town Lake and closer yet to Sky Harbor International Airport. Nearby development includes multifamily and single-family homes. Smith says Baltz School District lobbied for the acreage because it is north of the freeway. He's not picking a ground-breaking date, but his "best guess" is that the school district could start site work in six months.
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