TUCSON, ARIZONA — Vast Commercial Real Estate Solutions (Vast), a commercial real estate and investment brokerage firm, brokered the sale of an office building at 1630 East River Road, Tucson, AZ 85718. Located in Mesquite Corporate Center, a highly visible, multi-tenant office park with frontage along River Road, the 10,500-square-foot space sold for $2 million ($190.48 PSF) on February 28, 2022.

Mesquite Corporate Center is situated just west of Campbell Avenue, within walking distance of the restaurants and professional services at Joesler Village and St. Philip’s Plaza.

Jon O’Shea of Vast represented the Seller, 220Properties, LLC of Tucson, AZ. The Buyer, IXL Learning, Inc., was represented by Dave Volk of VOLK Company, a commercial real estate brokerage specializing in retail properties in Tucson and Southern Arizona.

The buyer plans to use it for expansion of their Tucson offices.

IXL Learning was founded in 1998 when it released Quia Web, the first website that allowed teachers and learners to create and share customized study materials. The initial version featured three formats: a matching game, a concentration game, and flash cards. Soon after, quizzes were added, along with a dozen more game types. The concept was an overnight success, and Quia Web quickly became one of the most popular education sites in the early days of the internet.

Its mission, since then, has been to develop educational technologies that people can’t live without—if only they existed. Its second product, Quia Books, is a highly interactive online textbook and workbook platform created specifically for language learning. Released in 2001, at a time when e-books weren’t much more than PDF readers, Quia Books supported immersive, online workbook exercises with real-time feedback and an intelligent grading system. These books are used in language courses ranging from Spanish and French to Chinese, Latin, and Arabic.

IXL is now used by more than 13 million students and more than 800,000 teachers, as well as at home by families worldwide, with offices in California; North Carolina; Toronto, Canada and Tucson.

For more information, O’Shea can be reached at 520.580.4743 and Volk is at 520.495.2238.

To learn more, see RED Comp #9690.

Menlo Group Commercial Real Estate negotiated the successful sale of Lake Biltmore Corporate Center, a two-building office property in Phoenix

Tempe, AZ – Menlo Group Commercial Real Estate is pleased to announce the successful sale of Lake Biltmore Corporate Center. The more than 100,000-square-foot, two-building, multi-tenant office property sold for $11.5 million ($113 PSF).

Lake Biltmore Corporate Center is located at 11022 and 11024 N. 28th Dr. in Phoenix. The two blue glass buildings total 102,00-square-feet and are situated on 6.86 acres of land with lakefront views. The property is positioned just off the I-17 freeway and across from the expanding Valley Metro Rail and soon-to-be-redeveloped Metrocenter Mall.

Menlo Group first started representing the property as a leasing assignment nearly 10 years ago. Over the years, the Tempe-based commercial real estate brokerage has signed dozens of leases and lease renewals with a variety of local and corporate tenants. At the time of the sale, Lake Biltmore Corporate Center was approximately 70 percent occupied, making it an attractive investment and value add opportunity.

“Working with the team at Menlo Group has been purely professional and enjoyable for almost 10 years now,” said Lois Flynn, General Manager of Lake Biltmore Corporate Center. “We’ve never had to worry about what’s down the road because they take care of business professionally, quickly and honestly. We’re always satisfied; no matter how big or how small a deal, this is how they do it. I’m very proud to have been partnered up with them for so long.”

The seller, Gammaville, LLC, was represented by Menlo Group Executive Vice President Stuart Milne, CCIM, SIOR. Philip Wurth, CCIM, of Colliers International represented the buyer, SSM Properties III, LLC. The sale was one of the largest office transactions in the Phoenix metropolitan area thus far in 2022.

“We appreciate the entire Gammaville team for their trust and partnership in helping make this a seamless transaction,” Milne said. “We trusted the process and knew this was a high caliber asset in a submarket going through a tremendous transition with the light rail and additional developments.”

TUCSON, ARIZONA — Tucson retail activity remained relatively stagnant in the last quarter of 2021. Metro Tucson ended Q4 2021 with 38,551-square-feet of negative absorption pushing the yearly total to 34,912-square-feet of positive absorption.

Tucson has approximately 2.2 million square feet of retail product that is currently available with 1.9 million square feet vacant. While there seems to be a lack of product and new construction deliveries, the Tucson retail market remains optimistic with new users and developers continuing to enter Arizona from out-of-state markets.

Availability and Vacancy
The Central submarket had the highest levels of vacancy with over 600,000-square-feet vacant space available.

The Central submarket posted the most notable annual decrease in vacancy, dropping 470 bps to 13.7% in the fourth quarter of 2021. Over the same period, the Northwest submarket dropped 120 bps to 5.9%. The Southwest submarket saw the largest increase in vacancy, growing 290 basis points to 7.9%.

Lease Rates
The direct average asking NNN lease rate in Q4 2021 was $15.99, $1.91 per sq. ft. NNN lower than the average rate from Q3 2021. The lease rate is down 0.8%year-over-year. For the last four years, the average monthly asking NNN lease rate ranged from $15.49 to $18.16, although rents vary considerably based on the product type and location. Some of the highest leasing rates are in the West and Northeast submarkets where the average asking NNN lease rate is $23.27 and $20.25, respectively.

Net Absorption and Leasing Activity
The Tucson retail market concluded 2021 with 38,551 square-feet of negative net absorption bringing the yearly total to 34,912 square-feet. The Southeast submarket led the market with 4,594- square-feet of net absorption with many small tenant move ins under 10,000 square-feet. One of the noteworthy transactions from this quarter included Big 5 Sporting Goods leasing 11,748- square-feet in the Southeast submarket.

Year-to-date net absorption totaled 34,912-square-feet led by the Northwest submarket, which accounted for 77,874 square-feet of positive net absorption. Over the same period, the Central submarket posted 28,862-square-feet of net absorption.

Development Activity
Construction activity has been stagnant in Tucson due to the rise in available big-box space which has provided additional options for tenants looking to expand. While there are smaller
retail buildings under construction, there has not been any new development activity on larger shopping centers since Q3 2019. While there are no large shopping centers under construction,
there are smaller shops underway at The Bridges and The Landing.

Outlook
Despite a year with low leasing activity and no minimal new construction, the Tucson retail market continues to have an optimistic outlook as new users from out of state are leasing space. As retail continues to bounce back from the Covid-19 pandemic, expect to see new retail developments enter the pipeline. The return to office should also be a huge benefit to the retail
sector as Tucson continues to grow its population base.

For full report, click here. For more information, contact Nancy McClure at CBRE Tucson office, 520.323.5117