CHICAGO—The partial revival of the metro area's economy got industrial developers to start up a round of speculative construction. And investors have also started to show interest in the new product. EnTrust Realty Advisors, LLC, an affiliate of The Alter Group, for example, just sold 1660 Wall Street, a recently built 108,732-square-foot warehouse and distribution building in suburban Mt. Prospect, to KTR Capital Partners, a New York-based real estate private equity fund manager that specializes in industrial property.

The speculative building is part of The Alter Group's Lake Center Corporate Park and sits near the intersection of Algonquin Rd. and Elmhurst Rd. just minutes from O'Hare International Airport. It was designed to appeal to major corporations and third-party logistics providers and features 30'clear ceilings, 19 exterior truck docks, two drive-in doors, and 16 trailer parking stalls.

“The industrial market is poised for enormous growth with annual absorption expected to reach 150 million-square-feet nationally in 2013, much of it driven by the growth of logistics and e-commerce,” says James I. Clark III, EnTrust's managing principal. “This building is a sound investment, being of the last large available sites this close to O'Hare with the convenient access to I-90 necessary for distribution and air freight firms to optimize their supply chains.”