CenterPoint picks up industrial complex near Hialeah for $23M

CenterPoint Properties just paid $23 million for a nearly 20-acre industrial complex east of Hialeah.

The company’s purchase of Airport East Distribution Center, a 397,585-square-foot warehouse campus at 7000 Northwest 32nd Avenue in Miami, breaks down to about $58 per square foot.

The seller is Equitable Real Estate Partners. Records show an affiliate of the company paid $17.5 million for the property in 2016, marking a 26 percent gain in two years.

The three-building industrial campus features 18- to 22-foot ceiling heights, secure truck courts and exterior storage. The complex, built in 1955, is 75 percent leased with asking rents averaging $6.95 per square foot, according to online marketing material.

It’s about four miles from Miami International Airport and eight miles from the Port of Miami – two major distribution hubs. Cushman & Wakefield’s Mike Davis, Wayne Ramoski, Gian Rodriguez and Skylar Stein represented the seller.

CenterPoint plans to make improvements to the property, including converting some of the 96,000 square feet of vacant space to office space to appeal to distribution companies, Rodriguez said.

Tenants include Econocaribe Consolidators and Olympia Building Supplies.

South Florida’s industrial real estate market is strong, especially in the Hialeah and Airport/Doral submarkets. According to a recent Miami-Dade CBRE report, about half of all industrial transactions in the second quarter took place in Hialeah. That includes Duke Realty’s recent $180 million purchase of Flagler Global Logistics’ 8 million-square-foot industrial park.

CenterPoint is known for buying big industrial properties. Last year, it dropped $108 million for a FedEx distribution center in Medley and picked up a 59-acre distributing center in Opa-locka for $59 million. 

Just last month, it bought an industrial warehouse in the Harbor Gateway region in L.A. for $21 million.