DuPont industrial park sale was most expensive in Pierce County in 2020
Story has been updated
A December real estate purchase in DuPont was the most expensive for 2020 in Pierce County.
Indianapolis-based Duke Realty announced Feb. 4 it had purchased The Cubes at DuPont in late December from St. Louis-based CRG and U.S. Logistics Fund. The property is a three-building, 1.6 million-square-foot industrial park.
Purchase price was $221 million, the most for any property in Pierce County in 2020 and seventh largest sale in the Puget Sound region for 2020, according to a ranking by Puget Sound Business Journal.
The next closest was the $119 million sale in October of the Village at Seeley Lake apartments in Lakewood, sold by New York City-based Blackstone via an associated LLC to Inland Real Estate Group of Oak Brook, Ill., according to data provided to The News Tribune from the Pierce County Assessor-Treasurer’s Office.
The Cubes’ sale price does not yet appear in the county record search.
A representative for CoStar Group Inc., a provider of real estate data to the industry, told The News Tribune via email on Tuesday the deal was confirmed with the listing brokers and buyer. CoStar Group shared an image of the sale’s listing in its system.
The lack of an excise tax filing in Pierce County appeared to be the result of a filing still in process.
“Per an owner’s representative, the acquisition was for the REIT (Real Estate Investment Trust) entity that owned the real estate, which is why you have not seen an excise tax statement,” Brandee Fish, commercial and appeals division supervisor for the assessor-treasurer’s office, told The News Tribune via email Wednesday.
“They recently emailed a copy of an ETN (Excise Tax Notification) they plan on processing. I did not see where it was recorded at this time.”
CRG and US Logistics Fund purchased the vacant former Intel campus in January 2018 to redevelop it as The Cubes at DuPont, a business park in DuPont’s Northwest Landing. Tenants include Kimberly Clark and Alliance Enterprises.
The bulk distribution facilities are adjacent to Duke Realty’s existing 1-million-square-foot distribution facility.
Other purchases
Duke also acquired a 63,546-square-foot facility at 21214 66th Ave. S. in the Kent Valley.
It also purchased 12.2 acres at 7409 S. 202nd St. in Kent where it plans to develop a 268,499-square-foot facility.
Combined, the DuPont and Kent purchases totaled just over $258 million, according to the Puget Sound Business Journal’s research of the projects.
“Duke Realty identified the Seattle market as a strategic growth market due to its proximity to ports, population growth, and land constraints,” said Mark Crawford, vice president and head of acquisitions for Duke Realty, in the company’s announcement Feb. 4.
Duke developed the Amazon fulfillment center in DuPont in 2013. It paid $26.1 million for that site in November 2012, according to News Tribune archives.
Fish declined to speculate as to whether this was the largest sale price in the county’s history.
“There have been many significant portfolio type sales that involve parcels in multiple counties and multiple states,” she noted.
Correction: The abbreviation ETN referred to in this case is an Excise Tax Notification. A previous version of the article misstated the definition.
This story was originally published February 11, 2021 at 12:06 PM.
