A Milwaukee area firm plans to move its corporate headquarters to a 158,000-square-foot industrial building that MSI General Corp. plans to build in Menomonee Falls.
Also, an affiliate of Wauwatosa-based real estate firm Wangard Partners plans to build an industrial building development on a vacant 10.7-acre site at 10851 W. Metro Auto Mall on the far northwest side of Milwaukee.
The Menomonee Falls building that would be built by MSI General is planned for a vacant, 32-acre site located southwest of Old Orchard Road and south of Main Street.
A village report says the company that would occupy the building has not been named yet by the developer. A commercial real estate source declined to name the company but said it is located in the Milwaukee area.
The company will have 130 employees in the building and the facility will operate three shifts, 24 hours a day Monday through Friday, the village report states. There will be 100 employees working on the largest shift.
The building will have 135,000 square feet of industrial space and a 22,945-square-foot office area. The industrial space will be used for light manufacturing, assembly and warehousing.
Meanwhile, Wangard has the Metro Auto Mall site under contract and is seeking City of Milwaukee Plan Commission approval for the project. Metro Auto Mall is currently dominated by auto dealerships.
Wangard plans to build either one 132,000-square-foot industrial building or two industrial buildings with a total of 128,000 square feet of space on the site. A single building development would cost $8.6 million. A two-building development would cost $9 million.
“It is our intention to purchase the site and to market to a variety of light industrial users in the metropolitan Milwaukee area with a notable focus on the northwest side,” the company said in information filed with the city.
Wangard plans to close on its purchase of the land by early August and begin construction within 12 months after purchase.
In information filed with the city, the company said it expects 100 to 150 people to work at the site once fully developed and occupied.
These industrial building projects are planned as vacancy remains low for the southeastern Wisconsin industrial real estate market. The region’s industrial space vacancy rate fell to 4.86 percent in the first quarter, down from 6.45 percent in the first quarter of 2014 and 5.82 percent in the fourth quarter of 2014, according to Xceligent. Second quarter data is not available yet. The region’s industrial real estate market absorbed nearly 2.8 million square feet of space during the first quarter of the year. It was the 19th quarter in a row of positive industrial space absorption for the region.
Waukesha County had a 3.34 percent industrial space vacancy rate and Milwaukee County had a 7.56 percent industrial space vacancy rate in the first quarter, according to Xceligent.
