AREA Property Partners Buys Warehouse Portfolio

AREA Property Partners affiliates have bought four Class A warehouses totaling about 835,000 square feet from Kansas City Life Insurance Co. for $23.6 million.

These are details on the four properties:

4650 Quality Drive, bought by AP Quality Drive LLC for $10.5 million. 371,050 square feet built in 1992 on 21 acres on the north side of Quality Drive west of the intersection of Lamar Avenue and Pleasant Hill Road. Shelby County Assessor’s 2011 appraisal is $7.7 million.

4100 Quest Way, bought by AP Quest Way LLC for $6.5 million. 230,178 square feet built in 1999 on 9.8 acres on the northeast corner of Quest Way and East Raines Road. Appraisal is $6.3 million.

3363 Miac Cove, bought by AP Miac Cove LLC for $3.7 million. 131,022 square feet built in 1999 on 7.7 acres on the northwest corner of Miac Cove and Miac Drive. Appraisal is $3.9 million.

4481 Pleasant Hill Road bought by AP Pleasant Hill LLC for $2.9 million. 102,152 square feet built in 1992 on 8.7 acres on the north side of Quality Drive west of the intersection of Lamar Avenue and Pleasant Hill Road. Appraisal is $2.8 million.

Purchase, N.Y.-based AREA Property Partners is an international real estate fund manager that has been investing in the U.S. since 1993 and globally since 1995, according to its website.

Tax bills are to be sent to Alpharetta, Ga.-based DW Management Co. LLC.

Source: The Daily News Online & Chandler Reports

– Daily News staff

Parkway Properties Reports Net Loss of $137 Million

Parkway Properties Inc. reported a net loss of $137 million for the year ended Dec. 31, compared to a net loss of $8.9 million for the year prior, as the company works to realign its investment strategy by exiting noncore markets, including Memphis.

Funds from operations – a widely accepted measure of real estate investment trust performance – totaled $47 million for 2011, compared to $61.1 million for 2010.

The Orlando, Fla.-based REIT specializes in the ownership of office properties. Parkway has been facing weak occupancy, low customer retention and an ownership model that does not enable the company to capture the true value of its investments, said Parkway President and CEO James R. Heistand during the REIT’s Tuesday, Feb. 7, fourth-quarter and 2011 earnings report conference call.

“Simply put, we need to own irreplaceable buildings and irreplaceable locations,” Heistand said. “We want to make sure the capital we put in is going to produce much better returns.”

In Memphis, Parkway is under contract with Santa Barbara, Calif.-based Hertz Investment Group to dispose of the following assets by the end of the first quarter: Falls Building, Forum I, II & III, and Toyota Center. Parkway’s remaining asset here, Morgan Keegan Tower, is also a targeted sale.

– Sarah Baker

Wright Medical Unveils Pre-Op Ortho Product

Wright Medical Group Inc. on Tuesday, Feb. 7, announced the 510(k) clearance and limited launch of its Prophecy Inbone Pre-Operative Navigation Alignment Guides for total ankle replacement.

The product is now available in select sites nationally, and full U.S. commercial release is anticipated sometime in the second half of 2012.

Prophecy Pre-Operative Navigation Alignment Technology uses CT scans to create patient-specific ankle alignment guides that facilitate a surgeon’s ability to precisely size, place and align the Inbone Total Ankle Replacement components during surgery.

Wright Medical, an Arlington-based medical device maker, is currently displaying the new product, alongside the company’s other orthopedic offerings, at the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons 2012 annual meeting.

With an estimated 4,000 procedures expected in the U.S. this year, total ankle replacement represents a growing market opportunity to treat the roughly 50,000 Americans annually who experience severe ankle pain due to end-stage ankle arthritis.

Today, about half of those patients are treated with ankle fusion, but Wright Medical says advances in implant design have made ankle replacement a feasible surgical option for many people.

In addition to providing pain relief, the company says ankle replacements can offer patients better mobility compared to fusion.

– Aisling Maki

Lockton Inc. Signs New Office Lease

Lockton Inc. has moved to a new office space in the Renaissance Center at 1715 Aaron Brenner Drive.

CB Richard Ellis Memphis supported Lockton with the leasing of its new space. Lockton signed a five-year lease for the approximately 5,500-square-foot space.

The company, which bills itself as the world’s largest privately held insurance broker, opened its Memphis operation in June 2011.

The office has added five insurance professionals who provide property-casualty insurance and employee benefits consulting to business clients.

Lockton also is actively recruiting risk-management and employee-benefit professionals to expand its sales and service team.

– Andy Meek

County Commission Approves Redistrict Plan on 1st Reading

Seven votes were there Monday, Feb. 6, for a new redistricting plan for the Shelby County Commission.

The commission approved the plan on the first of three readings that would change the five-district, 13-member body to a set of 13 single-member districts.

Amendments to the specific district lines are certain by or at second reading.

An alternate plan by commissioner Henri Brooks that would have created eight majority African-American districts instead of the seven in the plan that passed on first reading was voted down.

The commission also sent back to committee the long-delayed animal care ordinance, which recently was amended to allow anonymous reporting of suspected animal abuse through animal welfare organizations. Commissioner Steve Mulroy said the ordinance didn’t appear to have the votes to pass with that provision and he wanted a chance to craft a better compromise.

– Bill Dries

Elliot Perry to Discuss Art Collection

Former University of Memphis point guard Elliot Perry will participate in a discussion of African-American art as part of a celebration of Black History Month at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.

Perry will join fellow former NBA player Darrell Walker in a conversation with Michael D. Harris, associate professor of art history and African-American Studies at Emory University.

Perry and Walker will discuss their collections of African-American art and art of the African diaspora.

The free discussion will be held Feb. 26 at 2 p.m. in the gallery’s East Building Auditorium.

– Taylor Shoptaw

Job Openings Jump to Nearly 3-Year High

The number of available jobs in the United States jumped in December to near a three-year high, supporting other data that show a brighter outlook for hiring.

Companies and governments posted 3.38 million jobs in December, the Labor Department said Tuesday, Feb. 7. That’s up from the 3.12 million advertised in the previous month and nearly matches the three-year high reached in September.

Job openings in the private sector reached the highest point in almost three and a half years.

Still, overall hiring slipped, and the number of people who quit their jobs also declined. That suggests the job market still isn’t as dynamic as it was before the recession.

Manufacturers, retailers and professional and business services all posted gains. Professional and business services include temporary jobs. But they also include high-paying positions, such as architects, engineers and accountants.

The report on job openings follows Friday’s optimistic employment figures. Those showed employers added 243,000 net jobs in January, and the unemployment rate fell to 8.3 percent.

December was also a big month for hiring, but there were still 13.1 million people unemployed that month. That means an average of 3.9 people competed for each open job in December, the first time in four years that ratio was below 4 to 1.

In a healthy job market, the ratio is usually around 2 to 1.

– The Associated Press