W. P. Carey & Co. Pays $40 Mil for Scottsdale Office Complex

PHOENIX-In one of the bigger office deals of the year, New York-based W.P. Carey & Co. purchased an office building in north Scottsdale for $40 million. The facility is currently occupied by PCS Health Systems.

Purchase of the building was in conjunction with the sale of PCS Health Systems by Rite Aid Corp. to Advance Paradigm Inc., which resulted in the formation of AdvancePCS.

W. P. Carey purchased the 351,000-sf office building at 9501 E. Shea Boulevard in north Scottsdale , through a sale-leaseback agreement. The building is the pharmacy benefits management company’s largest operating facility and one of its dual headquarters locations.

W.P. Carey & Co. purchased the property through Corporate Property Associates 14 Inc., a public non-traded real estate investment trust and a member of the W. P. Carey Group. AdvancePCS has leased the building for an initial term of 21 years under a bond-type net lease.

“The transaction with AdvancePCS demonstrates the benefits available through sale-leaseback financing for corporations looking to complete complex, large transactions effectively and efficiently,” says Gordon Whiting, W. P. Carey executive director and president of Corporate Property Associates 14 Inc.

The AdvancePCS building is located in one of the hottest areas for new office development. The building is less than half a mile from the Loop 101, which opened just over two years ago. The new freeway now provides convenient access to north Scottsdale from the rest of the Valley. Demand for office development is coming from executives and owners of businesses who live in upscale Scottsdale and Paradise Valley and want to relocate their offices there, since the new freeway has made the area accessible to employees living in more affordable suburbs.

Prices for available land in the area is among the highest in the metropolitan area.

W. P. Carey (NYSE: WPC) is a limited liability company that manages four real estate investment trusts. The company manages more than 33 million sf of property in the United State and Europe.