85 Whippany Road in Whippany — Courtesy: Cushman & Wakefield
By Joshua Burd
Pharmaceutical giant Bayer is selling 86 acres adjacent to its North American headquarters in Hanover, offering a rare infill development site in one of the state’s top corporate submarkets.
Cushman & Wakefield is marketing the property at 85 Whippany Road in the town’s Whippany section, which is part of a 194-acre former Alcatel-Lucent campus that has undergone a high-profile redevelopment in recent years. The site is now home to Bayer’s 675,000-square-foot office complex and MetLife Investments’ 185,000-square-foot headquarters, which were delivered by Vision Real Estate Partners in 2013 and 2016, respectively.
Cushman & Wakefield’s David Bernhaut, Brian Whitmer and Mark Phillips are leading the assignment for Bayer, with additional support from Joshua Cohen of the firm’s Morristown office.
“This land parcel disposition represents the rare opportunity to acquire a large development site in one of New Jersey’s premier infill locations, and we’re already seeing strong interest from potential owner/occupiers and investors alike,” Bernhaut said. “85 Whippany Road is suited for a variety of future uses given the area’s dense, affluent demographics and large base of white-collar corporate employment.”
The brokers noted that 85 Whippany Road is currently zoned for professional office, research laboratories, state-licensed hospitals and nursing homes, childcare centers and other uses. Pending a zoning change, they said, the property could also attract potential uses such as multifamily, townhomes, hotel, retail or flex-industrial.
Located just off Interstate 287, Route 10 and Route 24, 85 Whippany Road has access from traffic-controlled intersections on Whippany Road at both Eden Lane and Parsippany Road, C&W said. The firm also highlighted the site’s location within the so-called Golden Triangle formed by Route 24 and interstates 287 and 78, along with Morris County’s average household income of more than $158,000.
The county is home to more than 40 Fortune 500 companies, with Barclays, Accenture, PWC, Allergan, Prudential Financial, BASF, Realogy and Novartis also located in the neighborhood, C&W said. Meantime, the brokerage team touted the nearby Route 10 retail corridor and sought-after housing and schools, along with the town’s proximity to downtown Morristown.
“We at Bayer are encouraged by the substantial interest we are receiving this early in the marketing process and are also eager to identify the best user to continue the positive development this neighborhood has experienced over the last couple of years,” said Matthias Muckle, head of U.S. Real Estate Group at Bayer. “We anticipate a competitive bidding process given the fact that this is one of the last few large vacant land parcels in the regional marketplace.”