Real estate firm buys Amazon warehouse for $108.74 million

Intercontinental Real Estate Corp.’s $108.74 million purchase of the Dragstrip Logistics Center, in Lakeland, earlier this month marks the latest in a line of investment interest in industrial properties within the Interstate 4 Corridor.

The deal by the Boston-based firm — the largest industrial sale of the past year throughout the region — also represents continued demand for Amazon-leased properties, especially since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“This building is one of the few 40-foot clear industrial properties in the corridor,” says Rick Brugge, an executive managing director with commercial real estate brokerage firm Cushman & Wakefield, who sold the property for Ackerman together with the company’s Vice Chair Mike Davis, Stewart Calhoun, Rick Colon, Casey Masters, Dominic Montazei and Zachary Eicholtz.

“It’s a new, modern building in a strategic location that will well serve the statewide logistics market.”

Steve Centrella, Intercontinental’s senior director of acquisitions, says the company was drawn to the 710,962-square-foot building because of its location and opportunity for “long-term cash yield.”

The 8100 State Road 33 property, of a cross-dock design with 146 dock-high doors and trailer and auto parking for 180 and 400 vehicles, respectively, becomes Intercontinental’s third in Florida. The company also owns an apartment project in Delray Beach and a distribution center in Jacksonville, according to its website.

Amazon began fully leasing the property shortly after its completion on 60 acres last fall by a joint venture between Atlanta-based Ackerman & Co. and TransWestern. The duo had paid $7.25 million for the site in November 2019, according to Polk County property records.

“We thought this location in the heart of the I-4 distribution corridor, in Central Florida, would be ideal for big-box logistics operations,” said Evan Ziegler, an Ackerman & Co. senior vice president of investments says, in a statement.

                  Intercontinental, which was formed in 1959 and today controls 134 properties nationwide valued at roughly $10 million, becomes the latest investor to spend nine figures on an Amazon-occupied property in the I-4 Corridor.

                  In May 2019, Industrial Logistics Properties Trust — also of Massachusetts — paid $123.6 million for a fulfillment center in Ruskin leased by the Seattle online giant. In that case, the 1.02 million-square-foot distribution center was part of an 18-building portfolio deal with seller Cole Office & Industrial REIT Inc.