401,797-SF Distribution Center Takes Off

The newest development for DFW's International Commerce Center will rise under a first-time direct partnership with BV Partners LP, a trio of one-time Trammell Crow Co. development and investment powerbrokers who struck out on their own in April 2003. When it came time to build industrial, Thomas Leiser, Pryor Blackwell and Charles Anderson knocked first on Crow Holdings' door. "We all got our starts through Mr. Crow," Leiser says, "and we're thrilled to be doing our first building with them."

The $12-million project will deliver in December, right when Leiser predicts the industrial market will reclaim ground for its share of the rebound. "It could be just perfect timing," he says.

The expectation is the project will be half or 100% pre-leased to "one or two" tenants at completion. The quoted rent has yet to be set. "We have some suspects, but I wouldn't call any of them prospects at this point," Leiser tells GlobeSt.com. "Once we break ground, people will get a lot more serious about the building." The Bandera team, taking the initial lead for leasing and management, will target importers of electronics, computers, apparel and footwear.

Leiser says the team spent six months negotiating the ground lease with the airport authority and now is talking for additional acreage. The Regent Boulevard tract has 2,000 feet of frontage along Interstate 635, sits in the North Foreign Trade Zone with a Triple Freeport exemption and is positioned right across the street from the 630,800-sf Trade Center I being built by their former employer.

Dallas-based Albert Halff Associates is the architect, engineer and landscape architect and CF Jordan LP of El Paso is the general contractor. The 210 dock-door distribution center is 1,000 feet long, 400 feet wide and has a 32-foot clear height and 138-feet deep truck courts. Along with all the bells and whistles of a state-of-the-art building design is a 64-trailer staging area, a real bonus considering today's trucking regulations.

Bandera kicked off this year with the purchase of two landmark office buildings in nearby Las Colinas and ramped up construction on an 18-location Whataburger franchise in Florida, with Crow Holdings as an indirect partner. "This is the first time to be a true straight-up partner with Crow Holdings," Leiser explains of the industrial project. "And, we're true partners in the fullest sense of the word versus a lot of other structures that are out there today."

When the market stabilizes, the Bandera trio plans to build one million sf annually...and not as merchant builders. "That's a product type we want to own long term," Leiser stresses. "Our hope is our children will own this warehouse."