GM Sells 852,000-SF Distribution Center in Fort Worth

The deal, closing in the final days of 2003, is believed to be the largest building to trade last year in Dallas/Fort Worth. The buyer was Industrial Realty Group LLC of Downey, CA, which a year earlier had bought Winn-Dixie's 801,174-sf distribution center at 5500 South Freeway, just miles from the newly acquired 41.4-acre property at 1101 Everman Parkway in the Carter Industrial Park near the intersection of Interstates 20 and 35.

General Motors was represented by John Aldrich and Ben Rutledge, both with Colliers International Inc. in Dallas. Industrial Realty Group's brokers and the building's leasing team are Trey Fricke and Walter Floyd with the Fort Worth-based NAI Stoneleigh Huff Brous McDowell.

Floyd tells GlobeSt.com that the deal came together in less than 60 days for an 18-year-old structure "with all the bells and whistles. Fundamentally, it's an excellent building and they were able to buy it at an attractive price."

Aldrich wouldn't discuss the sale except to confirm that it closed. The building was emptied in March 2003 when General Motors realigned the distribution network and took the parts warehouse operation to a smaller facility at AllianceTexas in northeast Tarrant County. As a result, the Everman Parkway property's assessment dropped from $18.4 million in 2002 to $11 million in 2003.

Fricke says the new owner started ripping out palette racking two days after the closing to ready it for immediate occupancy when the tire-kicking stops and the signing begins. The fully air-conditioned, Union Pacific Railroad-served building has 38-ft clear heights and 118,000 sf of mezzanine space plus 21,500 sf of office area. The space is being offered at $2.75 per sf triple net plus 80 cents per sf for all expenses.

Ideally, a single tenant will surface, but the building is readily divisible into quarters. Fricke believes the first deal will be struck in six months, right in sync with the cleanup completion on the first 200,000 sf. It might be one, it might be two or more ... but he believes the building will fill in nine to 12 months.

"I hope to lease it all to one tenant," Fricke says, "I may be overly optimistic, but we're the only people in town who will be able to deliver 800,000 sf ready to go. It's definitely the largest block of space in Fort Worth and it may be the largest block of space in all of Dallas/Fort Worth."