Lazenby Lines Out Warehouse Space (Real Deals)

Bill Lazenby of Fayetteville recently broke ground on a commercial project in north Springdale that will be valued at $8 million upon completion.
Lazenby paid Ronnie Ball and Ginny Wilson of Berryfield Apartments LLC of Fayetteville $1.14 million for property on the northeast corner of Lowell Road and Randall Wobbe Lane. The 13.24-acre parcel is located one block east of U.S. Highway 71 Business.
Stewart Title of Arkansas in Bentonville closed the sale.
First State Bank of Lonoke is financing the project.
Plans call for 120,000 SF of office/warehouse space. There will be 12 buildings that are 10,000 SF apiece. Each can be leased as one space or divided into four separate 2,500-SF units.
All the buildings will be constructed simultaneously. Lazenby plans to do initial build-outs on at least four of the buildings while the remaining buildings will be left in shell form until leased.
Shanna Kimball of Lazenby Properties LLC in Fayetteville is the primary leasing agent. A name has not been selected for the project and lease prices have not been formulated.
Lazenby Construction Inc. of Fayetteville and J & L Construction of Huntsville are serving as the general contractors.
Dennis Becker of Fayetteville is the architect.
CEI Engineering Associates Inc. of Rogers is the engineer.
The project is scheduled for completion this fall.
Dixie Building Blue Cliff College
Dixie Construction LLC of Fayetteville will be constructing a 30,000-SF building in Springdale that will be valued at about $5 million upon completion.
Blue Cliff College of Baton Rogue, La., has signed a lease to occupy 20,000 SF of the building, which will be located on 45th Street on the northeast side of the Interstate 540/U.S. Highway 412 intersection.
Dixie is the general contractor. PB2 of Rogers is the architect.
Dixie Excavation LLC and Armac Consulting Engineers PLLC, both of Fayetteville, also are working on the project.
Pam Jones with Dixie Development/Dixie Real Estate is the leasing agent for the building. The price per SF is $16.33.
Ben Israel is the owner of the Dixie entities and Armac.
Blue Cliff College is owned by Edward Moore and was established in 1987. It has nine locations in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and North Carolina. The college offers diplomas and associate degrees in allied health, massage therapy, criminal justice and cosmetology.
Blue Cliff’s Springdale campus is expected to serve about 350 students. Completion of the building is scheduled for October.
Ruth’s Chris Breaks Ground
Arkansas Chops LLC of Forrest City plans to break ground in April on a Ruth’s Chris Steak House in Rogers. The property will be valued at $4.5 million upon completion.
The project has not been assigned an address, but is located on Pinnacle Hills Drive between Starbucks and Metropolitan National Bank.
Plans call for construction of 9,500-SF building.
Bell-Corley Construction LM of Rogers is the general contractor.
McClelland Consulting Engineers Inc. of Fayetteville is the engineer.
Orlando, Fla., architect Craig Livingston of VOA Associates Incorporated is working on the project. Livingston has designed Ruth’s Chris restaurants all over the country.
The project is scheduled for completion in October, and the restaurant is expected to open in November.
Arkansas Chops, which is composed of Barry Pelts, William Orgel and two other investors, also plans to build Ruth’s Chris steakhouses in Tulsa and Little Rock, but have yet to finalize locations.
Tyson Unloads Rogers Property
Hudson Plaza LLC of Newport Beach, Calif., recently paid Tyson Foods Inc., through its Tyson Chicken Inc. entity, $2.93 million for commercial property in Rogers.
A Tyson Foods spokesman said the Springdale-based company no longer needed the space that was once used by Hudson Foods Inc. as its headquarters before Tyson acquired the company and its assets in 1998.
Since the acquisition, Tyson had used the property, which includes about 14 acres and two buildings totaling 40,000 SF, for corporate offices.
Staff there included internal auditors, specialty foods, Tyson Pork Group and environmental health and safety divisions. The 120 employees are being moved to offices in Springdale and Fayetteville.
Hudson Plaza was incorporated in Rogers by Peter Levshin on Feb. 21. His wife, Linda Levshin, also is a member and said the purchase was for investment purposes. She said Tyson Foods will occupy the facility for a few more months before new tenants are sought.
Harrals Executing Property Exchange
Ryder Truck Rental Inc. of Miami recently paid Harral & Harral LLC of Springdale $2.4 million for land and an existing building at 300 Industrial Circle in Tontitown.
The transaction was part of a Tax Code 1031 exchange.
Heritage Land Title of Arkansas in Fayetteville closed the sale and is serving as a qualified intermediary for Harral & Harral, which is composed of Chris Harral and Gary Horton Harral.
The 15,700-SF building and 3.75 acres of land is being used by Countryside Farm & Lawn Equipment Co., a John Deere tractor dealer. The company, owned by the Harrals, is moving locations to 843 W. Henri de Tonti Blvd. in Tontitown.
The Harrals have broken ground on a new store at that location, which includes 9.85 acres. The Harrals paid Shirley May Pinalto, Rosemarie Trout and Larry Sabatini $1.2 million for the property.
United Builders General Contractors Inc. of Springdale is serving as the general contractor.
Ryder Truck Rental is a subsidiary of Ryder System Inc. The company provides consulting for transportation, logistics and supply chain management. Its product offerings range from full-service leasing, commercial rental and programmed maintenance of vehicles to integrated services such as dedicated contract carriage and carrier management, according to its Web site.
A spokesperson from Ryder said the company plans to modernize the facility and add three bays. It will service about 500 trucks out of the facility.
McRoy McNair Set for Facelift
Richard Alexander, Rob Merry-Ship and John Nock, through their McRoy McNair Building LLC entity, recently paid RJ Merry-Ship Property Management $910,000 for an existing building in downtown Fayetteville.
Renovations to the three-story, 15,606-SF structure located at 17 E. Center St. will increase the value of the property to $2 million.
Rob Merry-Ship is the principal of RJ Merry-Ship and was the sole owner of the building before the sale, which evenly divides ownership of the building between Alexander, Merry-Ship and Nock.
Heritage Land Title of Arkansas in Fayetteville closed the sale.
Metropolitan National Bank of Little Rock is financing the project.
The building, which was built in 1936, has been gutted out to the shell. The basement level and ground floor level will be reserved for office/retail space while the third floor will be residential space.
The third floor will include six “loft-style” apartments that will be leased, not sold. Each one-bedroom, one-bath unit will be about 700 SF.
Sheree M. Alt of Alexander, Merry-Ship & Alt Real Estate Group Inc. in Fayetteville is the leasing agent.
Beard Buys Out Funeral Chapel
John W. Beard, through his Beard’s Funeral Chapel Inc. entity of Fayetteville, recently paid Mark Foster $1 million for land and an existing building at 855 S. Happy Hollow Road.
Beard has owned most of the building known as Beard’s Funeral Chapel since it opened in 1997. The purchase was for a portion of the 8,860-SF building that Foster leased to Beard. It also included 4.7 acres of land.
No bank or title company were disclosed.
Faucette Closes On Apartments
George Faucette Jr. and four partners recently paid Ben F. Schelgel Jr. and Sylvia Fellows $945,000 for an existing apartment complex in Fayetteville.
Mercury Settlement Services LLC of Fayetteville closed the sale. It was a cash purchase.
At The Pines, located at 1851 Deane St., includes three buildings totaling about 20,000 SF. There are 25 apartment units, including 24 that are 700 SF and one two-story unit that is about 900 SF.
Faucette said the complex is at about 92 percent capacity. Average rent for the two-bedroom, one-bath units is $360 per month. That will increase to the $450 range over the next few years as upgrades are made.
Partners in the purchase are Nancy and William Stewart, Figone Credit Trust and Figone Survivor’s Trust.
California Investors Target Clabber Creek
Mark Terrill and Rayma Milian-Rodriguez of San Jose, Calif., recently paid KBS LLC of Fayetteville $744,800 for four homes in west Fayetteville.
All four homes are on Shadow Crest Drive in Phase 3 of the Clabber Creek subdivision. The homes were built by HomeWorks Inc. of Fayetteville.
Joel Sanders of Allred Properties in Fayetteville assisted the buyers in the deal. Allred will manage the properties that will be leased out. KBS is comprised of Brandon Barber, Seth Kaffka and Justin Salter. Barber is chairman and CEO of The Barber Group, which owns HomeWorks Inc.