The most consequential signal out of Miami-Dade this week wasn’t a leasing statistic — it was two separate trades that both said the same thing: institutional capital has not lost its appetite for modern, fully leased industrial, even in a market carrying elevated vacancy from recent construction.
Ares Management acquired two fully leased warehouses from BGRE for a combined $108.7 million — a 230,147-SF Hialeah distribution center leased to Target and a 142,472-SF Sweetwater facility leased to LaserShip/OnTrac. Both buildings were completed in 2022–2023, and the pricing worked out to roughly the high-$200s per square foot.
That is not a discounted number. It is a buyer telling the market that a modern box with credit tenancy in place is worth paying up for, regardless of what the countywide vacancy rate says on paper.
Miami-Dade vacancy sits at 7.7%, which on its own reads as softening. But the leasing fundamentals underneath that number are healthier than the headline vacancy figure suggests: Q2 produced 3.0 million SF of leasing activity and 782,677 SF of positive absorption, with asking rents at $17.19/SF NNN. In other words, space is being leased and absorbed — the vacancy is a function of new supply hitting the market, not a demand problem.
That distinction matters for how we should be advising both landlord and buyer clients. A building with in-place, credit-quality leases in Miami-Dade right now is not competing against the countywide vacancy rate — it is competing against a shrinking pool of comparably stabilized assets, and institutional buyers are pricing it that way.
The second Miami trade this week reinforces a thesis we’ve been tracking for a few briefs now. Dalfen Industrial bought a 113,000-SF warehouse near Miami International Airport for $21.3 million from Terreno Realty — a 1973-vintage building, fully leased, reportedly to aerospace company AerSale. Terreno disclosed an 11.1% unleveraged IRR on its hold.
Capital chasing airport-adjacent industrial with aviation and MRO tenancy isn’t limited to brand-new logistics boxes. Older buildings in the right location, with the right tenant, remain liquid — and that’s a distinct submarket worth watching separately from the broader Miami-Dade logistics story.
For owners of stabilized, leased industrial in Miami-Dade — particularly anything near MIA with aviation-adjacent tenancy — this is a favorable window to test the market. For buyers, the message is that waiting for vacancy-driven price softness on well-leased assets in this submarket may mean waiting for a discount that institutional competition isn’t going to allow.
Market commentary based on reported transaction data; not investment advice. Figures per public deal reporting for the week of September 7, 2026.
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