Author: BEX Staff

Groundbreakings 1. Child Crisis Arizona held a groundbreaking last week for its new 38KSF campus on 2.4 acres on West Rio Salado Parkway in Mesa. 2. Construction has begun on the 8.5KSF expansion at the Abrazo Arrowhead Campus in Glendale. The addition will expand the neonatal unit from 21 beds to 35 and support the facility’s efforts to gain certification as a Level IIIB Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. The project is expected to deliver in late 2023. 3. The City of Maricopa held a groundbreaking ceremony for its Lake View Park improvement project. Phase I is expected to deliver this…

The School Facilities Oversight Board has authorized more than $70M for new school construction and land purchases for projects in the Queen Creek Unified School District. The SFOB allocation was 7% more than QCUSD had requested. The largest project on the list, a 90KSF facility currently named Elementary School #10 was allocated $27.8M for construction and $11.2M to purchase an 11.4-acre site for the development. Capacity is planned for 1,000 students, and the site will be located in the Eastmark area. The project had been part of a $198M bond request that failed to win approval in the November election.…

The City of Phoenix may sell 450 acres it owns near Luke Air Force Base for approximately $100M. The money would go to fund the City’s Aviation Department. The site is part of a roughly 820-acre unincorporated Maricopa County site Phoenix owns near Olive Avenue and Litchfield Road. The proposal would sell the northern half for industrial or commercial development. Phoenix is considering using the southern half for a solar energy project. The land is currently leased for agriculture and generates approximately $150K in annual revenue. A request for information was released last year. Four responses were received. The proposal…

By Roland Murphy for AZBEX Two recent land auctions are bringing major new developments to the North Loop 101 area of Phoenix and Scottsdale. In October, Garden Communities was the sole bidder for a roughly 41-acre property at the NEC of Deer Valley Drive and Tatum Blvd. just north of Desert Ridge Marketplace in north Phoenix. The land sold for the minimum bid of $44.1M, and the developer recently submitted the initial paperwork for an 882-unit multifamily development. A few miles to the east, Mack Real Estate Group paid $125M last March in a competitive bid for 124 acres at…

ICIC Property Investment 5 LLC is proposing a new mixed-use project on roughly 70 acres between 143rd Avenue and Litchfield Road south of I-10 in Goodyear. Planned potential uses for Goodyear Celebration Plaza include a 15-acre office campus with two 54KSF medical office buildings and one 140KSF, three-story general use office building. The MOBs and the overall site are intended to serve as amenities for the nearby Cancer Treatment Centers of America and City of Hope hospital. Also on the site will be multifamily development on 40 acres with 120 attached townhomes and 61 detached. Another multifamily component is planned…

A new analysis from The Business Journals shows commercial properties facing distress since the pandemic have lost $10B in property values. The analysis looked at 599 loans on U.S. properties facing some degree of distress, defined as properties flagged by loan servers as in some stage of foreclosure or at least 30 days delinquent on payments. Valuation losses since issuance exceeded $100M for 24 loans, nine of which are owned by lenders following unsuccessful foreclosure auctions. Retail properties make up 194 of the 599 loans, and 177 are hotels. Office properties have lost nearly $1.9B. Commercial Mortgage-Backed Securities properties in…

Boards & Commissions 1. Carrie Kelly, executive director of the Arizona Association for Economic Development, has been appointed Chair of the International Economic Development Council Public Policy Advisory Committee. 2. NAIOP has named David Krumwiede, Senior Executive VP with Lincoln Property Company, to serve a three-year term on its National Board of Directors beginning in 2023. Company News 3. Industry leader Daniel Mazzon has announced the launch of a new company that provides sales and operations representation for commercial real estate vendors in Arizona. The company, Mazzon Industries, begins its venture by signing two major clients: Ace Building Maintenance and…

Sales Transactions 1. Procter & Gamble has closed on the 430-acre site in Coolidge’s Inland Port Arizona industrial park where it plans to build a 2MSF manufacturing facility. The company paid Pinal Land Holdings LLC (Saint Holdings) $53.4M for the property. 2. Cushman & Wakefield represented The Opus Group in the sale of Warner Commerce Center, a newly built 197KSF Class A industrial project on 18 acres in Tempe. The property was acquired by Barings for $42.4M. Will Strong, Phil Haenel, Kirk Kuller, Molly Hunt, Cal Conway, and Stephanie Saccente with C&W’s Industrial Advisory Group – Mountain West team represented…

By Roland Murphy for AZBEX Arizona’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate decreased to 4.0% in December, down from 4.1% in November, according to the latest report published by the Arizona Office of Economic Opportunity. The national rate decreased to 3.5% from 3.6%. In Dec. 2021, the state had a seasonally adjusted rate of 3.9%, and the national was also 3.9%. The state had a net gain of 400 non-farm jobs over the month. “Prior to the pandemic (2010-2019), NSA nonfarm employment gained 5,600 jobs on average in December” the report states. Government lost 10,800 jobs in December. The private sector gained…

By Associated Builders and Contractors Construction input prices fell 2.7% in December compared to the previous month, according to an Associated Builders and Contractors analysis of U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Producer Price Index data. Nonresidential construction input prices also declined by 2.7% for the month. Overall construction input prices are 7.9% higher than a year ago, while nonresidential construction input prices are 7.6% higher. Crude petroleum prices fell sharply in December, down 14.9%, while natural gas prices surged 45.3%. “This Producer Price Index data represents another positive development on the inflation front,” said ABC Chief Economist Anirban Basu. “However,…