Dealmaker: Blackstone to Buy Colony Capital Logistics Assets for $5.9B

Blackstone affiliate Blackstone Real Estate Partners IX agreed to acquire Colony Industrial for $5.9 billion.

Colony Industrial owns parent company Colony Capital’s industrial real estate assets. Colony Capital Founder Thomas Barrack announced in September he plans to sell real estate assets and focus on digital investments.

With 60 million square feet of infill logistics assets including 465 light industrial buildings in 26 U.S. markets, Colony Industrial’s light industrial portfolio represents the lion’s share of the transaction. The portfolio has significant concentration in Dallas, Atlanta, Florida, northern New Jersey and California. The deal also included Colony Industrial’s 51 percent ownership interest in a four-million-square-foot portfolio of bulk distribution assets and the affiliated operating platform that manages the properties of both portfolios. 

Willkie Farr & Gallagher served as legal counsel, Morgan Stanley and Eastdil Secured served as financial advisors and CBRE National Partners served as Colony Capital’s real estate advisor. Simpson Thacher & Bartlett served as Blackstone’s legal counsel.

Colony said it expects to net more than $1.2 billion in the deal.

Blackstone Head of Real Estate Americas Nadeem Meghji said the acquisition demonstrates his firm’s continued conviction in logistics and positive e-commerce trends. Just last week Blackstone completed an $18.7 billion purchase of industrial assets formerly owned by GLP Logistics. That acquisition was announced on June 2.

“As retailers continue to shorten delivery times and expand their last mile footprints, we believe warehouses in dense population centers will continue to experience outsized demand growth,” Meghji said.

Both firms expect the deal to close this quarter.