By Jack Stubbs
Commercial property values on the Eastside continue to rise, and demand in core Eastside cities continue heading towards year-end 2019, and another recent transaction demonstrates that interest in cities like Redmond remains strong.
On December 11th, the Redmond Heights Tech Center, a five-building business park located in the bustling Willows Road corridor at 561 Willows Road NE and 14725 NE 87th St., sold for $37.5 million, or around $296 per square foot, King County records show. The seller of the property was Bellevue-based Wakefield Properties, and buyer was Alco Redmond Heights LLC, an entity based in Kent.
The recent transaction included two parcels comprising the five-building office/warehouse/flex business park, which totals 126,409 square feet, according to the seller’s web site. Originally constructed in 1983 and sitting on approximately ten acres, according to public documents, the campus offers easy access State Route 520 and is roughly two miles northwest of downtown Redmond.
Redmond Heights, which includes recently-renovated exteriors and high-end project landscaping and is located near the Sammamish trail system, offers tenants the opportunity and flexibility to grown and expand their business in the highly-sought-after Eastside market. According to Google Maps, some of the current tenants at Redmond Heights include CSA Group Seattle, JMS Construction, Eastside Masonic Center and SIMCO Electronics-Calibration Lab.
Building Two of the Redmond Heights Tech Center, a 72,000 square foot office/flex building, sold for $19.4 million, or about $269 per square foot, in July 2019, with Wakefield Properties acquiring the asset from Vancouver-based Nicola Wealth Management, according to The Registry’s reporting.
The five-building camps is located within the Willows Road business corridor, which has seen substantial transaction activity over the last few quarters.
In June, a five-parcel property just off of Willows Road sold for $40 million to ISP West Coast Holdings Inc. In another transaction Holliday Fenoglio Fowler secured joint venture equity and construction financing totaling $1454.7 million to proceed with the next phase of its three million square foot Esterra Park live-work-play community located at 2690 152nd Ave NE.
Earlier this year, KBS Commercial Real Estate Advisors acquired The Offices at Riverpark for $48.1 million, or $453 per square foot; while just days later, Unico continued its investment foray into Redmond, purchasing the 79,197 square foot Marymoor Technology Center for $23.5 million.
In late November, Equus Partners sold off the four-building Quadrant Willows Corporate Center in Redmond to The Roxborough Group for $73.6 million, or roughly $297 per square foot–high-end properties like Quadrant Willows and Redmond Heights Tech Center continue to benefit from their location in the expanding Eastside market, which is still propelled largely by the presence of established and emerging technology companies.
“The four buildings are situated in one of the strongest economies in the United States,” states Equus Capital on its website. “In addition to employment concentration in software, aerospace, technology, and wireless communications, Redmond, along with nearby Kirkland and Bellevue, serves as headquarters for the highest concentration of interactive gaming companies in the United States.” Other nearby companies include Amazon and Starbucks.
Founded in 1996, Wakefield Properties has worked to develop and maintain numerous commercial properties throughout the Puget Sound, including a 170,000 square foot retail center in Covington and the 335,000 square foot Snohomish Station shopping center. Wakefield also put together the 198-unit Trillium Heights at Issaquah Ridge, as well as The Timbers, a 337-unit rental project which it sold to Simpson Housing.
