The properties are at 15505 and 15601 South Avalon Blvd. in Gardena.The off-market sale was purchased using cash on hand.
“We continue to leverage our research and technology-driven originations platform to source off-market investment opportunities in Southern California’s highly fragmented and supply-constrained infill industrial markets,” Howard Schwimmer and Michael Frankel, co-chief executives of the company, said in a statement.
The property has 4.41 acres and was vacant at the time the sale closed. Rexford will demolish the site’s two existing buildings, which total nearly 64,000 square feet, and build a nearly 85,000-square-foot industrial building. The new single-tenant property will have tall clearance heights, dock-high loading and a large yard for container storage.
“Avalon Boulevard presents the opportunity to redevelop a prime land parcel by removing an older, obsolete building and constructing a new, state-of-the-art industrial facility positioned to command premium rents in the high-demand, extremely low-supply L.A.–South Bay submarket,” Schwimmer and Frankel said in a statement.
“With over $390 million of acquisitions completed year to date, we maintain a low leverage balance sheet as we capitalize upon our internal and external growth opportunities to create long term shareholder value,” they added.
The company now owns 233 properties and manages an additional 20 properties.
In October, Rexford announced its third-quarter earnings, reporting a nearly 24% increase in net operating income. The company acquired five properties for $68.7 million and sold three properties for $44.2 million during the period.
Industrial properties have performed well during the Covid-19 pandemic. CBRE Group Inc. found that the industrial sector has seen 41 straight quarters of positive net absorption. Vacancy, meanwhile, is near an all-time low.
And the brokerage expects ecommerce to demand an additional 2 billion square feet of new warehouse and distribution space in the next decade.
During the third quarter, 13.7 million square feet of industrial real estate sold or leased in L.A. County, up from 7 million square feet the previous quarter, according to data from Jones Lang LaSalle Inc.
