Bridge Investment Group Launches Logistics Platform

Last week, multifamily giant Alliance Residential Co. announced it was moving into the industrial space with the launch of Alliance Residential Co. 

Now another company with a significant presence in residential is moving into logistics: Bridge Investment Group LLC, which has announced the launch of Bridge Logistics Properties. The company, which had approximately $26 billion in assets under management as of March 31, 2021, is focused on select US real estate verticals, including multifamily, office, seniors housing, affordable housing, opportunity zones and debt strategies.

The Bridge Logistics Properties venture says its strategy will be to seek price dislocation, operational upside and innovative redevelopment in markets with a confluence of existing and increasing population density, rapid e-commerce adoption and constrained supply.

It also reports it will pursue a high-volume aggregation strategy that includes repositioning and development. It will seek to optimize returns with off-market, single asset investments. Bridge also says its infill-anchored portfolio will seek to generate a portfolio premium with scale, stability and diversity across logistics assets.

Jay Cornforth will serve as CEO and co-chief investment officer, and Brian Gagne will serve as co-chief investment officer for the Bridge Logistics Properties strategy.

Cornforth has over 25 years of experience and has directly invested or overseen $15 billion of deployment. Before joining Bridge, he was managing partner, global head of Logistics at Brookfield. Gagne also worked at Brookfield to build out and lead the US logistics investments team, where he oversaw both acquisition and development deployment from 2018 to 2021.

“We continue to look for new areas of the market where we see growth potential for our business, and we see that within the logistics properties space,” said Robert Morse, Executive Chairman of Bridge, in a prepared statement.

Simply put, investors are flocking to the hot industrial sector. A report from Colliers shows that industrial was the frontrunner for investors throughout COVID, with cold storage posting record volume in 2020, with sales up 22.9%.

“As the food supply chain rapidly evolves and modernizes, investing in the ‘last mile of food’ is the next frontier, with suppliers working to shift their current logistics and distribution networks closer to home,” the report states. “One of the driving forces is a surge in e-commerce volume, with groceries playing a prominent role.”