Jeff Milanaik, regional partner for Bridge Development Partners
By Joshua Burd
Bridge Development Partners has reaped more than $500 million from the sale of a 3.4 million-square-foot industrial portfolio, including more than 2 million square feet of space in New Jersey.
The privately owned firm on Tuesday detailed the blockbuster, three-state portfolio sale to Duke Realty Corp. Along with 10 existing distribution center buildings, the deal also calls for an additional phase involving two active development parcels in the Garden State, which will push the total value of the portfolio to close to $700 million.
At full build-out, the portfolio will span roughly 4.28 million square feet in northern New Jersey, Southern California and South Florida, Bridge said. The existing New Jersey properties span 2.26 million square feet of existing space and 852,000 square feet in buildings that are under construction, including:
- Bridgeport Logistics Center, a three-building 1.3 million-square-foot industrial development in Perth Amboy
- Bridge Point South Brunswick, a 488,884-square-foot building at 773 Davidson Mill Road in Monroe. The building is fully leased to two regional third-party logistics firms.
- Bridge Point Cranbury, a 264,085-square-foot building that was recently leased and is located at Route 130 and Broadway Road in Cranbury.
- Bridge Point Carteret, a 206,500-square-foot building at 900 Federal Blvd. in Carteret. Located just off New Jersey Turnpike Exit 12, the facility is fully leased for 15 years to Virginia Dare Extracts, which relocated from Brooklyn.
- Bridge Point Port Newark, a planned 661,000-square-foot facility at Delancy Street and Route 1&9 in Newark.
- Bridge Point Meadowlands, a planned 193,805-square-foot building now under construction at 5 Ethel Blvd. in Wood-Ridge and Carlstadt.
“We are extremely proud of the accomplishments of our New Jersey team,” said Jeff Milanaik, regional partner for Bridge. “Developing over 3.1 million square feet of buildings worth over $520 million in three years in such a challenging market as New Jersey is a testament to the talents and tenacity of our team.”
Brokers with CBRE National Partners and HFF helped to arrange the sale to Duke Realty.
Bridge has completed more than $2 billion in developments and acquisitions since the inception of its joint venture with Dallas-based Banner Oak Capital Partners in 2013. The firm, which is based in Chicago, hired Milanaik to lead its efforts in New Jersey when it entered the market in 2014.
“This portfolio sale is part of the $1.1 billion of new state-of-the-art industrial assets Bridge will sell in 2017,” said Steve Poulos, the firm’s founder and CEO. “The portfolio includes a mix of fully stabilized, partially stabilized and completely vacant assets.”
The deal comes nearly a year after Bridge sold its first project in New Jersey, a 263,415-square-foot building at 750 Union Ave. in Union, for $46.5 million. The sale translated to more than $176 per square foot, in a sign of the unprecedented demand for industrial space from investors.
RELATED: Bridge sells Union industrial site, its first in N.J., for $46.5M
The Duke transaction will be completed in phases, with the first and second phases having closed on Sept. 27 and Oct. 25, while the final phase is expected to close by year-end.
Tony Pricco, Bridge’s president, said the firm is keeping its pipeline full after the sale. The developer has a pipeline of more than $1.3 billion in value, which encompasses 10.3 million square feet in New Jersey and other supply-constrained major U.S. industrial markets such as Chicago, Miami, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Seattle.
Bridge on Tuesday also said its growth is a credit to a strong relationship with its joint venture partner, Banner Oak.
“We are very pleased with the execution of Bridge’s opportunistic business plan and this disposition, and look forward to providing the capital for Bridge’s future pipeline for many years to come,” said Aaron Murff, principal of Banner Oak.
