Industrial portion of building located at 1139 Lehigh Avenue is 100% leased
Bethesda, MD (January 15, 2019) – Riverside Business Center, a 424,000 square foot light industrial building, located at 1139 Lehigh Avenue in Whitehall, Pennsylvania, has entered into seven new leases comprised of 202,000 square feet of lease renewals with six tenants and 28,000 square feet with a tenant new to the building. With the execution of these leases, the industrial portion of the property is now 100% leased. The leasing activity has occurred since 1788/Riverside Business Center, LLC, an affiliate of 1788 Holdings, L.L.C., a Bethesda, Maryland-based real estate investment company, acquired the property in March of 2018. Leasing is managed by Lee & Associates of Eastern Pennsylvania with Brian Knowles, Principal, overseeing all leasing activities.
“Riverside Business Center primarily caters to users servicing the local and regional area within Lehigh Valley. Our successful leasing activity at the property is a direct result of the extremely healthy business environment existing in the Lehigh Valley region and the quality of the relationships we have established with the existing tenants,” stated Larry J. Goodwin, Principal of 1788 Holdings. “Since acquiring the property, we have reached out to each of the existing tenants to better understand their businesses and occupancy needs, and we have invested in a number of capital improvements at the property that we believe will have a positive impact to our tenants’ daily operations.”
In the coming year, 1788/Riverside Business Center, LLC intends to focus on completing upgrades to the building systems and common areas servicing the vacant office space contained on the second-floor of the property to improve overall function and feel of this space. The marketing strategy will target tenants in the 2,000 to 4,000 square foot range to improve upon the current 51% occupancy of the office space component of the building.
Constructed in 1910, Riverside Business Center has been improved and renovated on numerous occasions, with the last renovation occurring in 2006 with the investment of more than $9 million to convert the property from a single-user manufacturing facility into a multi-tenanted light industrial facility. Of the total square footage in the building, nearly 388,000 square feet is configured for industrial/warehouse space and the remaining 36,000 square feet is suitable for office space.
Positioned on approximately 34 acres of land, the structure features average ceiling heights of 20 feet; the availability of ample automobile and truck parking and a dry sprinkler fire protection system. Abutting the Lehigh River, Riverside Business Center is located adjacent to the Lehigh Valley Thruway (US Route 22) with immediate access to Interstate 78 and the Pennsylvania Turnpike. Lehigh Valley International Airport is less than three miles from the site; while Philadelphia is approximately 60 miles south and New York City approximately 90 miles west from the project.
Riverside Business Center is located within the Lehigh Valley market which is considered the 68th largest metropolitan area in the United States by population, the home to nearly 700,000 people, and a Gross National Product exceeding $39 billion. According to research generated by CBRE, nearly 128 million square feet of industrial space presently exists in the Lehigh Valley market with a vacancy rate of 9% at the end of the 3rd quarter of 2018. The vacancy rate in the Lehigh County submarket of Lehigh Valley, the trade area which is ore specific to Riverside Business Center, was 5.2%.
Nationally, the industrial/warehouse category has emerged as the most prolific real estate sector based on a confluence of factors led by the tremendous growth of the e-commerce industry and the need for companies to be within close proximity to major population centers.
1788 Holdings, LLC is a Bethesda-based real estate investment company. The company’s capabilities include the acquisition, development and strategic oversight of highly-differentiated residential, office, retail and industrial properties. For additional information, visit www.1788holdings.com