More warehouse growth comes to Katy

By: Karen Zurawski - Houston Chronicle

In the past two years warehouse deals involving more than 6 million square feet occurred in the Katy area, according to Ken Sager, vice president of EastGroup Properties.

He and David Hudson, vice president of leasing and development of Duke Realty, talked of continued growth at the Nov. 19 general assembly of the Katy Area Economic Development Council.

Developer of Ten West Crossing, EastGroup has expanded its focus to Grand Crossing Business Park, a 33-acre site south of Clay Road and west of the Grand Parkway. Groundbreaking for the first of six buildings on the site is expected to occur in the first quarter of 2020, he said.

Hudson talked about development of the 77-acre Clay 99 Business Park where construction has started on a 433,200-square-foot building.

Sager said his company entered the Katy market in 2012. He called it a diversified customer base and said his company targets the broadest range from 8,000 square feet to 130,000 square feet or bigger. Clients primarily include research and development, distribution, light assembly and manufacturing. “Your imagination can go as far as it can,” he said, “And we can provide a home for that.”

The success of Ten West Crossing led the company to its next project — Grand Crossing Business Park.

Ten West Crossing encompasses eight buildings and 577,000 square feet north of Interstate 10 and west of Mason Road on Merchants Way. Sager said that they just developed their eighth building of 45,000 square feet.

“Based on the success of this park, we were scouring the market for additional land,” Sager said. “We found 33 acres with frontage on (SH) 99.” The property is west of SH 99, south of Clay Road and north of Morton Ranch.

Sager anticipates a first-quarter start in 2020 in Grand Crossing with the first of six buildings at 121,000 square feet. He displayed a map that showed how amenities have increased in the Katy area since 2012 and added how that all benefits employees who work here from offering places for them to eat and shop to hotels where they can stay.

In the Houston-Katy area market, his company has 6.3 million square feet, eight business parks and 75 buildings with leasing at 98 percent, said Sager.

Hudson shared figures that show Duke Realty, a 46-year-old company, has 24 buildings, 54 acres and more than 7 million square feet. Company projects in the Katy area include the Amazon warehouse near Woods Road and U.S. Highway 90. He credited the Katy City Council for playing a key role in the company coming to the area.

Clay 99 is just north of Grand Crossing Business Park, said Hudson. “We like (Clay) 99 because of the access on all three sides,” he added as well as its proximity to Bridgeland and Elyson subdivisions.

“Anything west of the Grand Parkway is going to be very well-suited going forward for development,” Hudson continued.

When Duke Realty was a younger company it had a lot of space that had smaller tenants, he said. But the company found that difficult to manage. “A strategic decision was made not to get involved in smaller space,” he said. “We don’t look at any deals smaller than 100,000 square feet right now.”

karen.zurawski@chron.com

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