Infinity Properties just made another splash in Orlando’s industrial sector, acquiring a three-property, 10-building portfolio in Altamonte Springs.
The Miami-based firm, headed by Shane Decker and Brett Schlacter, paid $43 million for the properties, which included the 123,200-square-foot Altamonte Commerce Center, 62,400-square-foot Douglas Business Center and 82,000-square-foot Northlake Flex Park, the Orlando Business Journal reported. The price works out to about $161 per square foot.
Boston-based Longpoint sold the properties, which are roughly 10 miles north of Orlando and near Interstate 4. They were 95 percent occupied at the time of purchase.
The acquisition adds to Infinity’s 350,000-square-foot portfolio in the Orlando area, which includes assets in Kissimmee, Longwood and Sanford. The firm has no intent of slowing down, as it plans to continue targeting small-bay warehouses, like the 10 buildings in Altamonte Springs.
“We want more — we want to add more of these types of properties to our portfolio,” Decker told the outlet. “We are as active as we can be.”
Infinity aims to upgrade the assets with repaved parking lots, tenant-specific monument signs and LED lighting. The company expects to hold the properties for three to five years.
Decker expressed confidence in the appeal of small-bay industrial spaces, catering to tenants such as electricians, roofers and local tradesmen. He cited Orlando’s strong population and rent growth as compelling factors for investment, despite an uptick in industrial vacancies due to 3.5 million square feet of recently delivered space, the outlet reported.
Smaller industrial spaces are performing better than large industrial assets, according to CBRE’s David Murphy, calling it “a tale of two markets.”
Read more
“The smaller industrial deals — and we would define smaller as those deals for 100,000 square feet and less — are still very active,” he told the outlet. “We really haven’t seen any change in the amount of velocity for the smaller industrial deals.”
The average rent for industrial space in the Altamonte submarket is $11.72 per square foot, according to Cushman & Wakefield. The average vacancy rate is just shy of 2 percent, below the 5 percent vacancy rate in the overall Orlando metro.
—Quinn Donoghue