Chicago-based InterPark is pulling into the airport real estate market with a nearly $19 million land deal.
The company, which describes itself as the largest operator of parking real estate in the United States, bought a 25-acre lot on the southeast corner of 60th Avenue and Jackson Gap Street late last month for $18.8 million, or about $750,000 an acre or $18 a square foot, according to public records.
InterPark did not respond to a request for comment. Plans submitted to Aurora indicate the company wants to construct a 2,500-space parking lot for its PreFlight Airport Parking brand.
The land is a 10-minute drive to the airport and borders another parking lot to the east. It is part of the broader Porteos master development area, spanning 2 square miles from 68th Avenue to 56th Avenue.
“We’ve sold most of it, so we only have a couple of hundred acres left,” said Bill Wichterman, managing agent for Porteos.
Wichterman, who declined to talk about the InterPark transaction, said the remainder of the development will be dedicated largely to hospitality and retail uses that support the large industrial users in the area, which includes Costco, FedEx and Kroger.
“This is really the growth engine and the epicenter of industrial, distribution, manufacturing for this area. I think you’re going to see this kind of development continue all the way out to Front Range Airport,” Wichterman said, using the former name for the Colorado Air and Space Port, which lies about 7 miles to the east of InterPark’s site.
The development group that owns the remaining Porteos properties purchased the land in 2006 and is now under contract to sell its holdings to a new investment partnership, Wichterman said.
The land has become more valuable over the years. The original investors picked up the property for $20,000 per acre. Now, prices are calculated by the square foot and land near DIA won’t go for less than $15 a square foot, which averages to $650,000 an acre, Wichterman said.
“It’s been a terrific investment, but it didn’t feel that way until 2019,” Wichterman said, when four sales closed.
“That’s when I no longer woke up in the middle of the night thinking I’d lost all my family’s money.”
Not a single transaction occurred in the first six years of ownership, through 2012. In 2016, Walmart bought a large block that has yet to be developed, and three deals closed in 2018. In the past year, Amazon has purchased 86 acres there for future projects.
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