Chicago-area industrial sales were poised to reach an all-time high in 2018, helped in large part by the unrelenting rise in e-commerce sales nationwide.
That steady growth has translated into a need for industrial space, as online merchants look for warehouses to store their goods, logistics centers to handle deliveries and data centers to store computer servers.
This year, a data center accounted for the priciest industrial investment sale in Cook County. In that deal, San Francisco-based IPI Partners paid $118.9 million for a data center in suburban Elk Grove Village. It was one of two data center deals to crack the top five, joined by another in the South Loop.
Two manufacturing facilities and a logistics center round out the list, compiled from Cook County records.
1441 Touhy Avenue, Elk Grove Village | $119M
IPI Partners bought the 208,000-square-foot, 10-megawatt data center from T5 Data Centers.
Driven by high demand for digital storage, the U.S. data center sector continues to surge. A report published earlier this year found that data center investment reached record levels nationwide in 2017. Chicago climbed to the third-largest market in total inventory. A spike in the construction of Chicago-area data centers this year ballooned the industry’s regional vacancy rate to 11 percent, compared to 2 percent last year.
13535 South Torrence Avenue, Chicago | $87M
Chinese manufacturer CRRC Sifang America bought the CTA rail car plant it will operate on the Southeast Side for $87 million from developer CenterPoint Properties.
CenterPoint started work on the roughly $40 million plant in spring 2017 in its Chicago Manufacturing Campus. In June it officially transferred the property to the state-owned Chinese firm after completing the 380,000-square-foot complex on 45 acres at 13535 South Torrence Avenue in Hegewisch.
CRRC Sifang was reportedly investing $100 million in the facility after winning a $1.3 billion contract to build up to 846 new rail cars over 10 years for the CTA, the Chicago Tribune reported.
717 South Desplaines Street, Chicago | $34M
601W Companies bought this data center in the South Loop from Ascent Corporation for $34 million.
The building houses Netrality Properties’ Chicago Colocation & Interconnection Data Center, according to the firm’s website. It’s part of a network of data centers around Downtown, particularly in the South Loop, where a massive regional center sits at 350 Cermak Road.
New York-based 601W has a number of properties in the Chicago area, including the Aon Center and the office tower at One South Wacker. Its marquee project in the city is the ongoing conversion of the massive, long-vacant Old Main Post Office into 2.8 million square feet of new Downtown office space.
12161 South Alsip Avenue, Alsip | $32M
In September, Chicago-based Dayton Street Partners teamed up with an undisclosed institutional investor to pay $31.5 million for a 42-acre property at 12161 South Alsip Avenue in Alsip. The seller was Experior Transport, which is leasing back the three-building complex for 15 years.
Dayton Street also launched two large speculative industrial projects in the booming O’Hare submarket with partner Black Creek Group of Denver.
6710 South River Road, Hodgkins | $25M
Angelo Gordon & Company paid $25 million for a property in suburban Hodgkins that houses Vee Pak, a contract manufacturer for the health and beauty industry.
The sale-leaseback deal covers the 300,000-square-foot building at 6710 River Road.
New York-based Angelo Gordon also paid $20 million for a South Side baking plant in another industrial sale-leaseback deal this year.
The top 5 Chicago industrial sales in 2018
| NAME | Azure | PRICE RANGE | From $1,199,000 to $6,395,000 |
| ADDRESS | 333 East 91st Street | SIZE RANGE | From 1,063 Sq Ft to 2,952 Sq Ft |
| TYPE | New Building | AVG PPSF | $1,476 |
| TOTAL UNITS | 128 | TAX ABATEMENT | Yes |
| DEVELOPER | The DeMatteis Organizations, The Mattone Group | AVG COMMON CHARGE | $2.14/sf |
| BROKER | Douglas Elliman | FINISHED BY | Complete |