Real estate investment firm Asana Partners just bought the recently completed Warehouse District in West Palm Beach for $18.5 million, according to sources.
Johnstone Capital Partners, led by Edmund Hunter Beebe, redeveloped and sold the project, which consists of about 88,000 square feet of new commercial and retail space along Elizabeth Avenue, wedged between I-95 and Parker Avenue. Beebe is also a managing principal of Healthcare Real Estate Capital.
Johnstone Capital, a Palm Beach-based real estate investment firm, paid $5.7 million to assemble the six warehouses between 2015 and 2016, property records show. William Earl, vice president of Johnstone Capital, said the warehouse were “underutilized” when the firm bought them.
Warehouse District sold nearly fully leased to tenants that include the 14,000-square-foot food hall Grandview Public Market, VXIT, Palm Beach Squash Club, Steam Horse Brewing and the Japanese, British and German motorcycle retailer called Burn Up.
HFF’s Eric Williams, Manny de Zarraga, Danny Finkle and Luis Castillo represented both sides of the deal.
Built between 1925 and 1968, the warehouses sit on about 6 acres of land just south of the city’s downtown and near the Norton Museum of Art and the Henry Morrison Flagler Museum. Each building is connected by a pedestrian walkway which features a rail spur that was previously used by the former warehouse operators.
North Carolina-based Asana Partners acquires and redevelops retail properties in the United States and has a portfolio worth about $3 billion, according to its website. Over the summer, it paid $68.75 million for a seven-building, 61,400-square-foot retail portfolio in Miami Beach’s Sunset Harbour neighborhood.