Boston, MA NGKF Capital Markets has completed the sale of 13 self-storage properties for $186.4 million on behalf of its client, Harrison Street Real Estate Capital, LLC, based in Chicago. The portfolio amounts to more than 1.1 million s/f, including over 55,000 s/f of surface parking, and encompasses 13 assets total – six in New England, three in Texas and four in California. The properties were purchased by Sovran Self Storage, Inc., a self-storage real estate investment trust (REIT), which operates under the name Uncle Bob’s Self Storage. NGKF Capital Markets professionals Aaron Swerdlin and Kenneth Cox led the national Capital Markets team representing Harrison Street.

“This transaction is notable for a number of factors,” said Swerdlin, executive managing director of NGKF Capital Markets. “The sale of the Harrison Street portfolio marks the biggest transaction to close so early in a year, and its high-quality assets provided Sovran Self Storage with an entry into the competitive Los Angeles market. It is a big step forward for the company, which has been looking to make the right entry into the LA market for some time.”

“This transaction further underscores HSRE’s ability to acquire a number of disparate self storage properties, develop a comprehensive asset management strategy and then amalgamate the properties into a large, diversified institutional-quality portfolio. In doing so, we created a tremendous amount of incremental value for our investors and partners,” said Elliot Pessis, vice president of Harrison Street Real Estate Capital, LLC.

“The high-quality assets in this national portfolio attracted an unusually large amount of very diverse interest, and the large deal size supports the continued trend of portfolio investment sales in the self-storage sector,” added Cox, senior managing director of NGKF Capital Markets. “The capital is out there and the deep demand continues to support the aggressive portfolio environment. There is no question the storage industry is generating great interest in the institutional community as investor confidence in the product type has solidified over the last several years.”

Swerdlin, together with Cox, heads NGKF Capital Markets’ Self Storage Group. “We look at our team’s closings as a market barometer,” stated Cox. Swerdlin added, “In the past 30 months, Kenneth and I have completed nearly $1.5 billion in transaction volume. Using that as a gauge against overall industry transaction volume, the capital bench appears to be as deep as I’ve ever seen.”