CHICAGO—Investors from a diverse range of countries including Canada, Germany, and the UK have poured an average of $2.3 billion into the US industrial market over the past four years, but the March 2015 purchase of IndCor Properties by Global Logistics Properties Ltd. of Singapore for roughly $8 billion could be the harbinger of things to come.

“The foreign capital is here to stay,” Erik Foster, a Chicago-based principal with Avison Young and the practice leader for the company's national industrial group, tells GlobeSt.com. “The US is a safe haven for investors and the IndCor transaction is only one of what is probably going to be a couple more large entity platform sales,” some of which could be even larger.

The relatively new focus on industrial real estate “is a long-term trend,” he adds. “It's our belief that industrial is going to be a mainstay for investors both foreign and domestic.” The growth of e-commerce has driven much of this change, as the need for new facilities of ever greater size and sophistication has given investors a great deal of confidence in the sector. Furthermore, the practice of onshoring has become more common among manufacturers and brought more stability to US industry.