Cold storage is hot in New Jersey.
Elberon Development Group and Fidelco Realty Group, who are building a 140,000-square-foot refrigerated warehouse at 1029 Newark Avenue in Elizabeth, have just secured a 22-year, $34 million loan.
The 10.5-million-cubic-foot facility will be leased to FreezPak Logistics as its fifth location in the state, according to JLL, which worked with the development team to secure the loan combining construction and mortgage financing.
The JLL team representing the borrower was led by Michael Klein, Jon Mikula and Max Custer. The brokerage declined to disclose the lender but said it is a national life insurance company.
Read more
In 2017, Fidelco purchased the 7.85-acre site for $4.8 million, according to property records. It’s located four miles from Newark Liberty International Airport and Port Newark-Elizabeth Marine Terminal.
The pandemic accelerated the demand for cold storage, which was already on the rise pre-Covid as more people opted to shop for groceries online.
Most recently, California-based grocery startup Weee inked a 220,000-square-foot lease for a cold storage facility in Clifton, New Jersey.
At the onset of the pandemic, the Coresight Research U.S. Online Grocery Survey predicted that the coronavirus lockdown could lead to a 40 percent spike in online grocery sales in 2020, Supermarket News reported.