By Jack Stubbs
Seattle-based Talon Private Capital is often known for its investment in commercial office properties, but the company recently acquired an industrial property located in the Ballard neighborhood of Seattle. On Thursday, September 20th, Talon acquired the approximately 4-acre Marine Terminal property for $18.6 million from Commercial Marine Construction Company, according to public records filed with King County. The transaction was recorded on September 24th.
Neither the buyer nor the seller responded to calls for comment about the transaction in time for the publishing of this story.
The sale was for a 4.15-acre property—located at 4420 14th Ave NW and 1111, 1115, 1119, 1121, 1123, 1125, 1127, 1143 NW 45th St.—that sits adjacent to the Lake Washington Ship Canal. The property is comprised of a number of different buildings. Some of the current tenants occupying the Marine Terminal buildings include Northern Lights Inc., Dovetail and Motion & Flow Control Products Inc., according to Google Maps. One of the buildings on the property is an 8,000 square foot warehouse/retail building constructed in 1949, according to public records.
The property is approximately one mile west of Fremont, just across the water from Queen Anne and less than a mile from access to Washington State Route 99.
Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood has seen its fair share of activity and redevelopment opportunities over the last few months. In early January 2018, San Francisco-based Carmel Partners acquired a .5-acre development site—located at 2417 NW Market St., one mile northwest of the Marine Terminal property—for $11.75 million from Norene A. Compton. Carmel Partners is developing a 171-unit project at the site, which was approved at an Early Design Guidance meeting in mid-May 2018.
In mid-February 2018, construction began on Regency Centers’ Ballard Blocks II, a 114,000 square foot shopping center slated for completed in the middle of 2019. The mixed-use development, located at 1451 N.W. 46th St., will be across the street from Regency Centers’ Ballard Blocks project, a 131,000 square foot shopping center that contains a Trader Joe’s, LA Fitness and Ross, among other tenants. Ballard Blocks II will include a 25,000 square foot PCC Community Markets store, 25,000 square feet of space dedicated to retailer West Marine and a 12,000 square foot childhood Early Learning Center. Additionally, there will be two floors of office space on the fourth and fifth floors that total 25,000 square feet, which the Seattle office of JLL is helping to lease.
In mid-July 2018, a 1.93-acre, transit-oriented development site located at 1400 NW 56th St. was officially brought to the market by CBRE. The property is near the planned Ballard Link Light Rail Station, which will open its northern spur serving the Ballard neighborhood starting in 2035. The planned expansion of the light rail system has been awhile in the works. The Sound Transit 3 ballot measure—which proposed the construction of 62 new miles of light rail to form a 166-mile transit system—was approved by Central Puget Sound region voters in November 2016. Per the ST3 plan, the Ballard Link Extension, which will also be located along NW Market street, will provide light rail service from Ballard’s Market Street area through downtown Seattle via both tunneled and above-ground rails, according to Sound Transit’s web site.
Talon Private Capital’s current investment activities are focused in Seattle, Portland, Dallas and Austin, according to the company’s web site. The company recently added its M Management Partners division, which looks to provide property management, engineering, accounting and construction management services to its clients. Talon owns a number of commercial properties throughout the Puget Sound region in Bellevue, Seattle, Issaquah and Kirkland.
One development set to change the fabric of Kirkland—set on an 11.5-acre site at the corner of Central Ave. at 134 Parkplace Center in downtown Kirkland—is the Kirkland Urban development. A joint venture between Talon Private Capital, PGIM Real Estate and Ryan Companies Inc., Kirkland Urban is a 1.6 million square foot multi-phase, mixed-use development on which construction was begun in mid-2016 and will ultimately comprise of 50,000 square feet of plaza space and a 185-unit residential component, among other uses.
The first phase Kirkland Urban includes two office towers that will provide a combined total of 396,000 square feet of Class A office space, which is almost 50 percent pre-leased to Wave and Tableau Software. Construction on the first phase of Kirkland Urban is scheduled to be complete near the end of 2018 and businesses are expected to start opening in early 2019.
