Cordova Warehouse Sells for $1.1 Million

The 31,500-square-foot warehouse at 1211 Midas Cove in unincorporated Shelby County near Cordova has sold for $1.1 million.

An entity called EG Partners LLC bought the industrial property March 15 from Midas Cove Partners, which had acquired it in a 2001 quitclaim deed from Su Tsu Fon Lee and Peter Lee.

Built in 2001, the Class B warehouse sits on 1.6 acres on the west side of Midas Cove south of Cordova Park Road. The Shelby County Assessor of Property’s 2012 appraisal was $1.3 million.

EG Partners also bought an adjacent vacant parcel, listed as 1207 Midas Cove, from Su Tsu Fon Lee and George Lee for $158,860. The assessor’s 2013 appraisal of that property is $187,300.

No financing was associated with either purchase.

Source: The Daily News Online & Chandler Reports

– Daily News staff

Exeter Assigns Portfolio to Commercial Advisors

Pennsylvania-based Exeter Property Group has awarded the facilities management assignment of its newly acquired, 2.5 million-square-foot industrial portfolio to Cushman & Wakefield/Commercial Advisors Asset Services LLC. The four buildings were acquired from DCT Industrial.

Mark Jenkins, principal of Commercial Advisors Asset Services, said in a release that it’s an assignment his firm had previously with an institutional owner. Memphis-based Commercial Advisors manages and/or leases a portfolio of 24 million square feet in the Mid-South region. Commercial Advisors already works with Exeter as leasing agents on several of Exeter’s other buildings.

The four Class A buildings in the Southeast submarket include Memphis Trade Center III – a 74.1 percent leased, 1 million-square-foot building at 3955 E. Holmes Road completed in 2001. Commercial Advisors also has the leasing assignment for the 269,000-square-foot availability in the multi-tenant building.

The other three buildings are all fully leased to single tenants. Completed in 2003, the 806,000-square-foot Memphis Oaks Phase II at 5140 Memphis Oaks Drive is fully occupied by Technicolor Inc. The 400,000-square-foot Southpoint building, at 5155 Citation Drive, was completed in 2000 and is home to AT&T Cingular. And Ozburn Hessey Logistics occupies Distriplex Farms, a 300,000-square-foot building at 6225 Global Drive built in 2000.

– Sarah Baker

Hunter Fan Co. Gets New CEO

John Alexander is the new CEO of Hunter Fan Co.

Alexander replaces Chuck Smith, who is transitioning to a senior advisory role for the company’s board. Smith worked with Hunter for 14 years, including six as CEO.

Alexander spent most of his career at Whirlpool Corp. As vice president and general manager of Whirlpool’s $3 billion Whirlpool brand, Alexander helped grow market share by creating customer loyalty programs, introducing new products, and working closely with key customers. As vice president of new business development and innovation, he led new high-growth businesses such as Gladiator, Commercial Laundry and Whirlpool’s licensing business.

Most recently, Alexander was president of the Americas for Diversey Inc., a $3 billion leading global provider of cleaning and hygiene products.

During his three years at Diversey, Alexander helped introduce new products, expand international distribution, and led his organization to sustained annual profitable growth.

– Andy Meek

Council Approves Demonstration Conditions, Car Sharing

The Memphis City Council approved Tuesday, March 19, on third and final reading an ordinance that gives the police director the discretion to set conditions on parades, marches and demonstrations.

The conditions include requiring any group from outside Shelby County seeking a march permit to put up a surety bond or deposit that is half of the cost of providing police protection. It also bans those in the gathering from carrying guns under Tennessee law or wearing masks or other disguises.

The council began its consideration of the ordinance last month as a Ku Klux Klan organization announced its intention to demonstrate March 30 on the steps of the Shelby County Courthouse. The organization later filed for a permit with the city and the permit was granted.

The ordinance’s provisions for a surety bond or deposit for police services will not apply to the Klan march, Collins said, on the advice of city attorneys.

The council also approved a resolution designating four on-street parking spaces for car-sharing vehicles as part of a three-year pilot project run by the Downtown Memphis Commission.

The commission is working to find a company that will operate under contract to run the business in which customers could rent the cars on a short-term basis.

The parking spots will be free of charge to that company during the pilot period.

Two of the parking places are on the north side of Gayoso Avenue in the block between South Main Street and Nov. 6 Street. The other two are on the east side of South Main between Huling and Talbot streets.

– Bill Dries

Calls to Abuse Hotline More Quickly Answered

The Tennessee Department of Children’s Services says more calls to its abuse hotline are being answered and the wait time for callers has dramatically decreased.

The Tennessean reported new data from DCS showed it usually took less than 40 seconds for a call to be answered. That’s a marked improvement from the average of more than three minutes in 2012. In the call center’s worst-performing months, calls sometimes weren’t answered for more than five minutes.

The goal is to answer 90 percent of calls within 10 seconds – a standard used by emergency dispatchers.

The call center gets about 165,000 calls per year, with callers reporting cases of suspected abuse or neglect of children statewide.

Nearly two-thirds of the calls result in a caseworker responding. The other calls are about cases already under investigation or about situations in which the caller did not have sufficient information to warrant checking on, officials said.

The telephone number to report suspected abuse of children is 877-237-0004. Reports also can be made online at https://reportabuse.state.tn.us/.

– The Associated Press

Big River Steel CEO Hopes for Fall Groundbreaking

The developer behind a planned $1.1 billion steel mill in Northeast Arkansas says he hopes to break ground on the project this fall if everything goes as planned.

The Legislature still needs to approve $125 million in state financing for the proposed Big River Steel mill to be built near Osceola.

Developer John Correnti spoke Tuesday with Mississippi County officials regarding the project. According to the Courier News, Correnti says he hopes to have a construction and operating permit by the end of April.

Officials say the mill will create more than 2,000 temporary construction jobs and more than 500 jobs once it’s up and running.

The Legislature is expected to discuss the financing next week.

– The Associated Press

Freddie Mac Accuses Big Banks of Rigging Lending Rate

Freddie Mac has sued 15 big international banks, including JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America and Citigroup, accusing them of rigging a key interest rate and causing huge losses for the government-controlled mortgage giant.

Freddie filed the lawsuit in federal court in Alexandria, Va. It names the banks that set the London interbank offered rate, known as LIBOR, which provides the basis for trillions of dollars in contracts around the world, including mortgages, bonds and consumer loans.

In a growing scandal, two big British banks and Switzerland’s largest have been fined hundreds of millions of dollars for manipulating LIBOR by U.S. and British regulators.

A U.S. watchdog has found that Freddie and its larger sibling Fannie Mae together may have lost more than $3 billion on their investments from banks’ rate-rigging.

The banks schemed together daily to manipulate and hold down the value of LIBOR from August 2007 through at least May 2010, Freddie alleges in its suit.

Spokesmen for Bank of America Corp. and Citigroup Inc. declined to comment on Freddie’s suit. JPMorgan Chase & Co. spokesmen didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

– The Associated Press