Blackstone bought a huge industrial portfolio next to Miami International Airport for $56 million.
The private equity giant bought the three warehouses totaling 367,848 square feet at 3208 Northwest 72nd Avenue and 3108 Northwest 72nd Avenue for $152 per square foot, records show. Airport Trade Center, which lists Haim Yehezkel as one of its principals, is the seller. Yehezkel leads the real estate firm Elysee Investments in Miami Beach. The warehouses were built in 1972 and last traded for $13 million in 1999.
Demand for industrial properties, especially those near the airport, has increased significantly in recent years due to the rise of e-commerce. In Miami Dade-County, vacancy rates held steady at 4 percent in the second quarter compared to the same period of 2018, even with 725,000 square feet of newly completed construction, according to a recent report by Colliers International South Florida.
Blackstone has been betting big on industrial properties on a global scale. In March, the company paid $18.7 billion for warehouse assets across the U.S in one of the largest industrial real estate deals in history. Blackstone is also assembling $6.8 billion worth of its European warehouse properties into a new company that it ultimately will list publicly or sell.
In South Florida, Blackstone recently closed on a Pompano Beach industrial site at Southwest 13th Court for $9.6 million. In July, a Blackstone affiliate bought two industrial vacant lots in Medley for $7.2 million. —
