300acre Airport West Complex Sold For 1144 Million

By Marilyn Bowden
Airport West’s 300-acre International Corporate Park has been sold to Keystone Property Trust, a real-estate investment trust, for $114.4 million, or $63.20 a square foot.

The price, which includes $67.6 million in assumed debt, covers 13 warehouse-distribution buildings built between 1996 and 2002, said seller Edward W. Easton of The Easton Group.

He said Easton will retain control of a 82,000-square-foot warehouse-condo project scheduled to be finished in January; International Place, a 10-acre, 170,122-square-foot community shopping center Easton is developing with Courtelis Construction at the front of the park; and about 30 acres of vacant land.

"We plan to continue building warehouses on that land," he said. "Keystone has an option to participate in that."

Easton, he said, will continue to handle leasing and management for the park.

The 1.7 million-square-foot property at States Roads 826 and 836, Florida’s Turnpike and Interstate 75, is the largest office-industrial park in the county. It has been named Best Corporate Park of the Year several times by the Building Owners & Managers Association.

In an area where vacancy stands at 12.7%, according to Cushman & Wakefield’s third-quarter industrial report, International Corporate Park is 97% leased, Mr. Easton said. Tenants include Federal Express, Airborne Express, Exel, Bax Global Expediters, Eagle Global and Air Express International with an average lease term of about four years and an average size of 70,000 square feet. Dole, USPS and Carmax are among owner-occupiers of several custom-built warehouses in the master-planned park.

The purchase marks the first entry into the South Florida market for Pennsylvania-based Keystone, which owns and develops bulk warehouse and distribution facilities in the eastern US. Its primary markets are New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Indiana.

"Keystone had been looking at our property for some time now," Mr. Easton said, "and we felt the timing was right to sell."

"International Corporate Park is a significant property in this market," said Edgar Jones, director of Florida operations for the Rockefeller Group. "It’s great to see an outsider coming in and validating the strength and attractiveness of the South Florida and Miami markets."