UTF Completes Sale-Leaseback Transaction with Dixon Hughes Goodman

MIAMI—United Trust Fund (UTF) is pressing forward into opportunity. The Miami-based firm, which specializes in sale-leasebacks and the purchase of net leased corporate real estate is acquiring and developing new properties.

First, UTF snapped up the Dixon Hughes Goodman office complex in High Point, NC, which is between Greensboro and Winston-Salem. The acquisition included two class A office buildings totaling 46,645 square feet on five acres of land.

UTF purchased the office complex from Dixon Hughes Goodman and leased it back to the accounting firm under a long-term triple net lease. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

“This is a very good tenant,” Fred Berliner, senior vice president at UTF, tells GlobeSt.com. “Dixon Hughes Goodman is the largest accounting firm in the Southeast and the 14th largest in the U.S. That’s important to us.”

UTF is also developing a $203 million build-to-suit project for Mercy HealthCare. The development includes a 196,000-square-foot orthopedic hospital in Springfield, Mo. and a 225,000-square-foot medical office building and surgery center in Edmond, Okla. When completed, the project will be leased to Mercy Health on a long-term net lease agreement.

“Outpatient surgery centers attached to medical office buildings are very much en vogue,” Berliner says. “We are seeing a resurgence on the market and we don’t expect the debt problems in Europe to make a major impact on commercial real estate in the U.S.”