IDI Logistics inked an auto parts manufacturer to a 292,000-square-foot lease in a warehouse development in Joliet, adding to a strong leasing run for the Chicago industrial market.
Accuride Corporation will take all of Building 14 in the Atlanta-based industrial developer’s Rock Run Business Park at 4050 Rock Creek Boulevard.
Accuride, based in Evansville, Indiana, will consolidate Chicago-area locations in Batavia and Naperville into the new building in Joliet.
Avison Young’s Mike Fonda, Chris Lydon, Chris Tecu and Brian Pomorski represented IDI in the lease negotiations, while Mohr Partners’ Mark Urbanowicz and Matt Burton represented Accuride.
IDI has built out the business park, which sits in the Interstate 80 industrial submarket, over the past 25 years. It has developed 27.1 million square feet of industrial space in the Chicago market and more than 200 million square feet globally.
The I-80 submarket has seen considerable speculative construction in recent years, with 4.3 million square feet currently under construction across nine buildings, according to Avison Young.
All that demand is pushing industrial construction starts to new highs. In the Interstate 80 and I-55 corridors alone, close to 50 million square feet of industrial space was under construction last year or had been completed in the past five years.
Overall, the Chicago-area industrial market has been good to developers and investors in recent years.
The area’s industrial vacancy rate fell to 6.3 percent in the first quarter, a slight dip from the fourth quarter of 2018 and the lowest level in 18 years, according to a recent Colliers International report. It was the sixth straight quarter in which vacancies fell and the 28th straight quarter in which demand outstripped new supply.