Bayless Manufacturing Inc., a Valencia metal fabricator and precision machine shop, has sold its two buildings for around $12 million, according to L.A. commercial real estate brokerage CBRE Group Inc.
Operating in Valencia since 1989, Bayless sold the buildings to Sierra Nevada Investment Group Inc., an industrial real estate investment firm in Los Angeles. Bayless signed a six-year lease with Sierra Nevada as part of the sale-leaseback deal.
The buildings, located at 26100 and 26140 Avenue Hall at the corner of Avenue Stanford in the Valencia Industrial Center, were on the market for about six weeks, said Robert Valenziano, a broker with CBRE who represented Bayless with CBRE broker Craig Peters. Craig Lyon of Craig Lyon Commercial and Steve Calhoun at Colliers International represented the buyer.
Directly adjacent to the 5 Freeway within the Valencia Industrial Center, the structures are two Class A concrete-tilt-up buildings that offer attractive clearance and loading, and also significant power for manufacturing, according to a CBRE statement.
The sale was transacted through a managed-bid process, in which a property is presented to capital markets, and brokers educate investors about the property and call for bids. For the seller, the process provides a pool of bidders and allows the property owner to study and compare offers and select the most favorable one.
Demand for industrial property of this kind is “extremely strong,” said Valenziano. “It’s a quality building and a quality tenant who has been in business and in the community for a long time – it was competitively sought after.”
There were around 10 qualified offers from private and institutional investors. A Sierra Nevada statement notes that the Valencia industrial submarket, which has a record low vacancy rate of 1.86 percent, has been one of the strongest in Southern California since the recovery.
Vacant space in Valencia, especially for larger buildings, has become very limited and rental rates have been steadily rising to reflect this lack of supply. Demand is expected to continue to outpace supply in the foreseeable future, according to Sierra Nevada.
Valenziano said that a number of factors played a role in the owner’s decision to sell the property, including a desire to invest capital in the company and timing in the market due to the high demand for quality properties. In addition, the lease-back arrangement offers the tenant the ability to continue operating at the present location without having to move.
