Author: BEX Staff

By Les Shaver for GlobeSt.com  As COVID-19 forced lockdowns across the country, the amount of vacant sublease increased in the first half of 2020, according to new figures from Cushman & Wakefield.   C&W monitored activity across 83 office markets and 92 industrial markets in North America and determined sublease vacancy generally increased across the office market and minimally throughout the industrial market in the first half of the year.  C&W found that 15MSF of total office sublease space was added to the market in the first half of the year. The market experienced a 21.8 percent increase in total office sublease space, which accounts for 1.4 percent of total…

Groundbreakings  1. Salt River Project and sPower announced construction is underway on East Line Solar, a new solar power plant that will bring $10M in 25 years of tax revenue and up to 350 construction jobs to Pinal County.  2. The Town of Payson plans for its splash pad took a step forward with the demolition of an old building in Green Valley Park near the Rim Country Museum on September 15th. The town hopes to have the splash pad by next summer.  3. Turning Leaf of the Nazarene Church broke ground on September 27th, on Litchfield Road just south of Bethany Home Road.  4. On September 15th, Trinity Christian School celebrated a groundbreaking ceremony for their new campus at…

By Tasha Anderson for AZBEX  A new Residence Inn hotel is being proposed on 2.37 acres of the Agave Development in the Southwest District Overlay of Tempe.  Applicant and civil engineer, Sustainability Engineering Group, LLC, on behalf of the owner The Barclay Group is requesting a use permit to allow a hotel in the General Industrial Zoning District, another use permit to increase the maximum building height for the hotel from 60 feet to 63 feet, and approval of the site plan, building elevations and landscape plan.  To be called the Residence Inn Tempe, the project is proposed as a five-story, 111-room hotel at the SWC of Ranch Road and Harl Avenue.…

Budget, Policy & Stimulus News  Small Business PPP-Type Loan Program Needed  An opinion piece in Triangle Business Journal by Editor-in-Chief Sougata Mukherjee summarized the looming disaster faced by small businesses as extended unemployment benefits dry up, along with the initial small business assistance provided by the Paycheck Protection Program to alleviate COVID-19 impacts. Despite wrangling by both major parties before the pending November elections, Mukherjee calls for immediate and comprehensive bipartisan relief efforts before it’s too late for many small businesses. (Source: Phoenix Business Journal)  Oro Valley Giving $1M in Small Business Aid  Oro Valley is allocating $1M to assist local businesses with its new OV Safe Steps initiative. The program gives qualified businesses financial reimbursement of up…

Source: Business Wire  Iron Mountain Incorporated announced it has signed a six-megawatt data center pre-lease with a U.S.-based Fortune 100 customer in Phoenix, at its new AZP-2 data center. The lease is expected to commence in the third quarter of 2021. The data center solution met all of the customers’ requirements, including scalable capacity, network proximity to other deployments, and a design that provided flexibility and reliability.  AZP-2 is a hyperscale-ready data center powered by 100 percent renewable energy. The three-story purpose-built facility will span more than 530KSF and deliver 48MW of total IT capacity at full build out, with campus connectivity to the existing 47MW…

By Philip Haldiman for Independent Newsmedia  A significant funding source that has generated about $4.3B in tax revenues since 2006 for transportation in Peoria and throughout Maricopa County expires in 2025, so city officials are planning to ensure they get a piece of the pie if funding is renewed.  Proposition 400, approved by 58 percent of Maricopa County voters in 2004, provided the Valley with a half-cent sales tax for transportation that resulted in some of the region’s biggest projects during the past 10 years.  Peoria officials are submitting projects they hope will be included in the extension of this massive tax plan come…

Giving Back  1. Resolution Copper has awarded more than $185K in grants to five area school districts for the upcoming school year. Along with supplying personal protective equipment (PPE) for teachers and students, the funds will ensure that up to 600 students in the Superior, Globe, Hayden, Miami and Ray school districts will receive technology to support distance learning.  Awards & Accolades  2. ABI Multifamily Vice President Mitchell Drake has been named a winner of the Connect Commercial Real Estate (CRE) Next Generation Award recognizing outstanding real estate professionals age 35 and younger in the Phoenix/Southwest Category.  3. Alexandra Stoicof passed the licensure exam and became a Professional Landscape Architect (PLA) for the State of…

Sales Transactions  1. The Praedium Group purchased Liv North Valley, a 385-unit luxury multifamily asset adjacent to the intersection of Interstate 17 and Loop 303/Bob Stump Memorial Highway, for $90M. Steve Gebing and Cliff David with Institutional Property Advisors, a division of Marcus & Millichap, represented the seller and procured the buyer.  2. CPI Superstition Sunrise Owner LLC purchased Superstition Sunrise RV Resort, a luxury, 55-plus RV resort with 1,119 spaces at 702 S. Meridian Road, Apache Junction, for $88M. HARRI5 represented the buyer. The seller was Superstition Sunrise.  3. Tides Equities purchased Solara at Mill Avenue, a 515-unit multifamily community at 3730 S. Mill Avenue, Tempe, for $77M. CBRE’s Tyler Anderson, Sean Cunningham, Asher Gunter, Matt Pesch and Danny Baker represented the sellers, a partnership between Acre Valley Real…

By Tasha Anderson for AZBEX  Owner, Village Property Management, LLC is looking to redevelop an outdated commercial site into a vibrant, mixed-use project that will be located near the Scottsdale Greenbelt at the SWC of Hayden and Osborn Roads.  “The current layout of the buildings is dated,” according to the project documents. “Specifically, the center features two “big box” spaces which combined total over 40KSF of the available space. In a national trend, such big box tenants are downsizing and, in some case, disappearing.”  Called Lucky Plaza according to the submitted documents, or Greenbelt 88 according to the project’s website, the mixed-use development proposes a multifamily component consisting of 300 units and about 22KSF of ground…

Budget, Policy & Stimulus News  Double-dip Recession Possible Without New Stimulus  The U.S. economy is at a crossroads, with some analysts saying a failure by Congress to pass another stimulus package, even as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to spread, would tip the nation back into recession. Lawmakers remain deadlocked over a measure to provide another round of $1,200 checks to most households and more aid to struggling small businesses and unemployed Americans. (Source: AZCentral)  Get Familiar with Arizona’s PDA  Under Arizona’s Purchaser Dwelling Act, a purchaser of a residence is barred from filing a construction defect lawsuit until the purchaser gives the seller – including residential contractors – reasonable notice of…