Blackstone was undeterred by the uncertainty surrounding tariffs and closed a $718 million deal to acquire a massive Crow Holdings industrial portfolio.
The world’s largest alternative asset manager bought a portfolio of 25 buildings totalling 6 million-square-feet from the Dallas-based developer, according to a release from Newmark, which advised on the deal. It works out to about $120 per square foot.
The properties are located in Dallas, Houston and Chicago. The deal gives Blackstone a 95 percent stake, with Crow Holdings and its partners retaining the remaining 5 percent.
Meanwhile, Blackstone is doing the opposite in South Florida. Alongside partner Link Logistics, Blackstone has cashed out on more than $1 billion worth of industrial properties in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties since November.
The Crow Holdings deal was announced in April, about a week before Blackstone Chief Operating Officer Jon Gray predicted tariffs would “slow some of the movement towards real estate” in a first quarter earnings call.
CEO Stephen Schwarzman foretold a silver lining: tariffs would be a boon for industrial real estate values by driving up construction costs and putting a damper on new supply.
Dallas-Fort Worth led the nation in absorption of industrial space in the first quarter, according to CBRE Research. The market surpassed 4 million square feet of net absorption. Dallas-Fort Worth ranked second behind Phoenix in the size of its industrial pipeline, with 11.1 million square feet.
The vacancy rate in DFW was 9.1 percent in the first quarter, above the national average of 6.3 percent.
Meanwhile, industrial property sales are strong in North Texas.
Over the last 12 months, there were 787 industrial property sales in DFW totalling $1.3 billion, CBRE reported, citing CoStar Capital Market Analytics. The average sales price for these transactions was $129 per square foot.
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