CHICAGO—Overseas buyers made 2015 a historic year for the US industrial market. Investors from Singapore, Canada, Abu Dhabi and Norway were behind several mammoth portfolio sales, the largest of which was Global Logistics Properties' $8.1 billion buy of IndCor , an industrial platform put together by Blackstone . Nothing on this scale has yet materialized in 2016, but the hunger for US industrial properties remains quite keen, and experts believe we could see several major portfolio buys before the end of the year. However, instead of mega-portfolios with properties that span the nation, this year's landmark transactions will likely involve regional portfolios that sell for less than $3 billion. “Foreign capital still has an appetite for industrial product,” Mark Detmer , managing director of JLL's industrial capital markets practice for the Western US, tells GlobeSt.com. “The fundamentals across the country are outstanding.” Not only have vacancy rates plunged, but developers have “had a very temperate approach to new construction, and that has pushed up rental rates throughout the US.” Blackstone and other groups began picking up properties in 2010, when the market was at a low point. But those mega-portfolios like IndCor? “They're not out there right now,” says Detmer. Instead, his group is tracking about three regional portfolios, which will probably sell for between $500 million and $2 billion. In addition, he expects perhaps three other similar regional portfolios to hit the market later this year. For sellers, it makes sense to now offer up smaller portfolios, Detmer adds. Put simply, there just aren't enough buyers with the resources of GLP, making any additional such sales inefficient. However, he is confident that the buyers exist for regional portfolios. “There are a lot of groups that can play in that range.” Foreign investors are not the only groups expressing interest in big industrial investments. Detmer says REITs, public pension funds and other institutional investors are all looking to increase their holdings in this robust sector. “Industrial is underweighted in most of their portfolios,” he explains, partly because the properties have not been available in sufficient numbers. A slight majority of the investment activity in this year's first quarter has been in the $20 million to $150 million range, according to statistics from JLL, and only 2.9% exceeded that number. By contrast, in 2015 just 21.6% of first quarter volume was driven by smaller deals, and transactions worth more than $150 million made up 56.4% of the volume. Overall, first quarter volume declined 52.6% year-over-year. But even though that may seem like a drastic drop, if the historic IndCor transaction is excluded, the decline was only 11.4%. Although the investment volume for 2016 will probably not hit the record-high of 2015, the case for continued investment is remarkably strong. The US vacancy rate dropped another 10 bps in the first quarter to just 6.2%, a 16-year low. And driven by the growing need for new distribution facilities that can handle the demands of e-commerce, net absorption in the first quarter was 7.3% higher than the amount of new construction. “That's why industrial is the darling of the commercial real estate world,” says Detmer. CHICAGO—Overseas buyers made 2015 a historic year for the US industrial market. Investors from Singapore, Canada, Abu Dhabi and Norway were behind several mammoth portfolio sales, the largest of which was Global Logistics Properties' $8.1 billion buy of IndCor , an industrial platform put together by Blackstone . Nothing on this scale has yet materialized in 2016, but the hunger for US industrial properties remains quite keen, and experts believe we could see several major portfolio buys before the end of the year. However, instead of mega-portfolios with properties that span the nation, this year's landmark transactions will likely involve regional portfolios that sell for less than $3 billion. “Foreign capital still has an appetite for industrial product,” Mark Detmer , managing director of JLL's industrial capital markets practice for the Western US, tells GlobeSt.com. “The fundamentals across the country are outstanding.” Not only have vacancy rates plunged, but developers have “had a very temperate approach to new construction, and that has pushed up rental rates throughout the US.” Blackstone and other groups began picking up properties in 2010, when the market was at a low point. But those mega-portfolios like IndCor? “They're not out there right now,” says Detmer. Instead, his group is tracking about three regional portfolios, which will probably sell for between $500 million and $2 billion. In addition, he expects perhaps three other similar regional portfolios to hit the market later this year. For sellers, it makes sense to now offer up smaller portfolios, Detmer adds. Put simply, there just aren't enough buyers with the resources of GLP, making any additional such sales inefficient. However, he is confident that the buyers exist for regional portfolios. “There are a lot of groups that can play in that range.” Foreign investors are not the only groups expressing interest in big industrial investments. Detmer says REITs, public pension funds and other institutional investors are all looking to increase their holdings in this robust sector. “Industrial is underweighted in most of their portfolios,” he explains, partly because the properties have not been available in sufficient numbers. A slight majority of the investment activity in this year's first quarter has been in the $20 million to $150 million range, according to statistics from JLL, and only 2.9% exceeded that number. By contrast, in 2015 just 21.6% of first quarter volume was driven by smaller deals, and transactions worth more than $150 million made up 56.4% of the volume. Overall, first quarter volume declined 52.6% year-over-year. But even though that may seem like a drastic drop, if the historic IndCor transaction is excluded, the decline was only 11.4%. Although the investment volume for 2016 will probably not hit the record-high of 2015, the case for continued investment is remarkably strong. The US vacancy rate dropped another 10 bps in the first quarter to just 6.2%, a 16-year low. And driven by the growing need for new distribution facilities that can handle the demands of e-commerce, net absorption in the first quarter was 7.3% higher than the amount of new construction. “That's why industrial is the darling of the commercial real estate world,” says Detmer.