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Daily News for Commercial Real Estate & Business – July 1, 2011

I hope you have a Safe & Happy Independence Day Weekend! I will not be sending out a news update on Monday but will pick it back up for you on Tuesday!

Here are the news articles you might find interesting today for commercial real estate and business:

To view the June/July 2011 Chain Store Age magazine, click here.

CANADIAN REIT ADDING TO VALLEY OFFICE PORTFOLIO WITH $27+ MILLION BUY . . . WANTS MORE In a deal scheduled to close at press time, a limited partnership formed by Artis REIT in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada (TSX:AX.UN, Armin Martens, CEO) was expected to pay $27.075 million ($189.64 per foot) to purchase a 142,773-square-foot office property located at 2550 W. Union Hills Drive in Phoenix. The seller is a company formed by Pacifica Real Estate Group in Santa Barbara, Calif. (Jerry Beaver, chairman). View article…

LBA REALTY SPENDING $12.3 MILLION FOR OFFICE BUILDING AT 44TH STREET AND VAN BUREN In a deal set to close at press time, a fund managed by LBA Realty in Irvine, Calif. (Steven Layton, et al., principals) was expected to pay $12.3 million ($89.74 per foot) to acquire a 137,069-square-foot office building at 444 N. 44th Street in Phoenix. The seller is R. Craig Hannay of Hannay Investment Properties in Phoenix, as receiver for a commercial mortgage backed security (CMBS) that owns the asset. View article…

CA Investor Pays $30M for Walmart-Anchored Center An investor based in Los Altos, CA, has acquired Tatum Point Shopping Center for $30 million. The buyer, Tatum Venture LLC, purchased the 173,529-square-foot, Walmart-anchored neighborhood center from Scottsdale, AZ-based Tatum Point LP. The sale, which did not include the Walmart, represents one of the largest single shopping center trades in the Valley since 2008. View article…

Denali buys Scottsdale warehouse for $1M Denali National Trust VI LLC in Scottsdale paid a little over $1 million for an office and warehouse building in the Scottsdale Airpark. The seller of the 17,600-square-foot property located at 7399 E. Tierra Buena Lane was Zions National Bank. View article…

Phoenix ranks 88th on Forbes ‘business’ list for cities Phoenix has hit the low end of the spectrum in the latest Forbes magazine’s latest “Best Places for Business and Careers.” Phoenix ranked 88th on the list, coming behind such locales as Anchorage, Alaska (39), Huntsville, Ala. (17), Brownsville, Texas (79), and Clarksville, Tenn. (87). The magazine ranked the 200 municipalities in the U.S. View article…

Universal Technical Institute laying off 80 in Arizona, 195 nationally Universal Technical Institute will lay off about 80 people in Arizona and 195 nationally to lower its annual costs. The layoffs are necessary because Scottsdale-based UTI is expecting to see a drop in enrollment this year as the economy has hampered its ability to attract new students, said John Jensen, vice president corporate controller of UTI. View article…

Riding the Elephant: Insights from 26 Million Commercial Properties Across the U.S. Most CRE data providers cite statistics based on securitized mortgages as market-wide trends. But, did you know that the 100,000 securitized mortgages make up only 0.4 percent of the CRE market? That equates to the size difference between ants and elephants. In today’s world, access to “elephant data” is what separates successful investors from the pack. View article…

Feel free to contact me regarding any of these stories, the current market, distressed commercial real estate opportunities or your property.