This Week’s Chicago Deal Sheet – December 15th 2020

One year after breaking ground on Bridge Point Itasca, a 741K SF industrial campus in suburban Itasca, Bridge Development Partners has leased almost two-thirds of the project to long-term tenants, company officials said in a press release.

Costco-Innovel Solutions is the latest to sign a long-term lease and will immediately occupy 112K SF in Building 1. Bridge will continue to build out the interior space, which Costco-Innovel will use for the last-mile distribution of consumer products.

“Our newest tenant, along with the existing users in the park, will cement this development as the premier modern industrial offering in the entire Chicagoland region, and further demonstrates the ever-growing demand for top-of-the-line industrial space across the country,” Bridge Development Partners Chicago Region partner Nick Siegel said in the release.

The three buildings at Bridge Point Itasca measure 248K SF, 247K SF and 245K SF. All feature 32-foot clear ceiling heights.

Bridge acquired the 48-acre property in 2018 from Entercom Communications Corp. and removed the two landmark radio towers that were transmitters for CBS Radio. The developer broke ground on the project in November 2019 and completed it in summer 2020.

Chris Nelson and Jeffrey Janda of Lee & Associates represented Bridge Development Partners, while Avison Young’s Chris Lydon and Brian Pomorski represented Costco-Innovel Solutions.

EXECS

McShane Construction Co. President Jeff Raday will retire at the end of the year. Executive Vice President Mat Dougherty will then transition into the president’s role. Raday joined the Rosemont, Illinois-based firm in October 1996 as vice president and was promoted to president in March 1998. During that time, the firm expanded into new markets including Arizona, California and Alabama, and annual revenue grew from $60M to $600M. Dougherty joined McShane in 2000 as a project engineer.

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Chicago-based Holly Duran Real Estate Partners joined Colliers International Chicago. Holly Duran leads the firm and will serve as a Colliers principal and financial services lead for the global brokerage’s local office. Her brokerage partners have also joined Colliers, with Jeff Mulder serving as executive vice president and Lois Durkin and Jeff Newcom serving as senior vice presidents with Colliers’ Occupier Services Group.

Duran founded her eponymous company in 2004 after acquiring the Real Estate Services Group of The Levy Organization, where she had served as managing broker and longtime business partner to principal Larry Levy.

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Refiloe Lethunya and Dan Gabbard joined Kiser Group, a Chicago-based multifamily brokerage, as advisers. Michael Yangas joined as an associate. Lethunya will focus on the northwest neighborhoods of Chicago, while Gabbard will focus on multifamily properties throughout Chicago’s North Side.

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Dylan Batman joined Maverick Commercial Mortgage as an analyst. He most recently spent four years as an associate at Fidelity Capital Management in Chicago. Previously, Batman was a property administrator at Chicago-based McCaffery Interests.

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Wingspan Development Group hired Todd Younger as fund and investor relations manager. Younger will launch and coordinate the WDG GP FUND LLC, a $15M real estate private equity fund. The fund will focus on multifamily, mixed-use and land development projects.

SALES

A Chicago-based 1031 exchange buyer purchased for $11M the Super Regional Two-Tenant Center, a 130K SF retail property at 1317-1321 East Golf Road in suburban Schaumburg. Marcus & Millichap’s Sean Sharko, Austin Weisenbeck and Adrian Mendoza marketed the property on behalf of the seller, a trust. The trio also secured and represented the buyer.

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An undisclosed local investor purchased 656 West Wrightwood Ave., a 55-unit vintage apartment building in Lincoln Park, for about $8.5M. The same teams also recently completed the $5.9M sale of 640 West Wrightwood Ave., a 52-unit apartment building steps away.

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Venture One Real Estate purchased four land sites totaling 25 acres in the western suburbs for an undisclosed price from CenterPoint Properties. The four properties, each fully leased to bus fleet operator Laidlaw/First Services, are school bus parking/staging sites for Kane and DuPage County’s respective school systems. The sites are:

• 22W760 Poss St. in Glen Ellyn, a 6.93-acre facility.
• 250 West 63rd St. in Westmont, a 5.36-acre facility.
• 1000 Swanson Drive in Batavia, a 7.21-acre facility.
• 425 North Villa Ave. in Villa Park, a 5.77-acre facility.

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Redwood Capital Group acquired Hunter’s Glen, a garden-style apartment community at 245 North Oakhurst Drive in west suburban Aurora. The company plans to renovate the majority of the apartments and upgrade most of the common areas. The acquisition was made in a joint venture with Heitman LLC. Built in 1991, Hunter’s Glen consists of 16 residential buildings and has 320 apartments, a clubhouse, a dog park and a 24-hour fitness center.

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An undisclosed New York-based firm bought for $4.7M a newly constructed, net-leased Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin property at 1215 George Towne Drive in Pewaukee, Wisconsin. Jimmy Goodman and John Feeney of The Boulder Group represented the buyer in the transaction, which was a 1031 exchange. The seller was a local real estate firm.

LEASES

Methods Machine Tools signed a long-term lease for 36K SF at 70 Prairie Parkway in northwest suburban Gilberts. Brown Commercial Group’s Dan Brown negotiated the lease on behalf of the tenant and the landlord, Cratos LLC. The tool manufacturer will more than double its space after moving in March from 2400 Vantage Drive in nearby Elgin.

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Anritsu Infivis signed a lease for 61K SF in Elk Grove Technology Park, a 600K SF industrial park at 701 Innovation Drive in Elk Grove Village. Newmark’s David Creiner and Corey Chase represented the company. The new regional headquarters will enable the company, a supplier of product inspection equipment for food and pharmaceutical production lines, to better meet the delivery times required by its customers in North and South America.

FINANCING

CEDARst Cos. refinanced the Draper, a 342-unit apartment complex at 5050 North Broadway Ave., with an $81.7M Fannie Mae loan arranged by PGIM Real Estate. The Draper was a largely vacant, mid-century office building redeveloped by CEDARst in 2019.

CONSTRUCTION AND DEVELOPMENT 

Forward Space, a woman-owned office furniture provider, held a virtual ribbon-cutting ceremony on Dec. 7 to celebrate its new headquarters at 650 North Wood Dale Road in suburban Wood Dale. The company’s new hub, completed by PREMIER Design + Build Group, combines 78K SF of warehouse space with 22K SF that serves as open office workspace and product showroom. PREMIER’s team included Phil Van Duyne as project manager and Scott Lebak as project superintendent.

THIS AND THAT

According to CommercialCafé, 7.5% of Chicago’s major office properties, totaling 52.5M SF, were fully renovated between 2000 and 2019. The average age of these renovated properties is 63 years, and Chicago came in sixth among big CRE markets in terms of office renovations.