Westcore is so confident in Union City's industrial market that it's getting ready to build four buildings totaling over 300k SF. That's no sweat for Westcore senior leasing associate Meghan Sandlin, who recently locked down four industrial deals totaling 107k SF in two Westcore properties. (Invasion of the Forklifts!) Meghan was a South Bay broker at Cassidy Turley before making the jump to Westcore nearly three years ago; now Westcore has 2.5M SF in the Bay Area and is also busy developing in Fremont. (Sources tell us Westcore's about to buy a sizable building in Union City, too.)

She's seeing tenants move their warehouses to Hayward and Union City as they get priced out of the Peninsula. That’s made it easier for Westcore to capitalize on its vacant space. Its 33508 Central building in Union City had a pretty big hole a year and a half ago and now there’s just 18k SF left. Out of the three tenants duking it out for a 26k SF chunk in Q4, packaged consumer goods company Core-Mark got the space (which had a desirable freezer component). Strapak was being pushed out of its location and needed space ASAP, so it inked 30k SF in the building. Meghan has seen Union City rents increase 4% or 5% over the last six months as availability tightens.

Industrial vacancy in the area was a low 5% in Q4, according Lee & Associates data. The leasing story in Livermore isn't quite as active but still healthy, she says. Masterpiece Cookies, a manufacturer of frozen cookie dough and baked cookies, renewed for more than 26k SF at Westcore's Greenville Business Center in Livermore, while Bauer Pacific Imports, a wholesale distributor for costume accessories and party decorations, also renewed for 21k SF in the same building at 174 Lawrence. (Cookie and party tenants clearly go hand in hand.) A couple tenants are circling in on a remaining 47k SF block up for grabs at the center, she reports.