Westcore Properties has already been on a feeding frenzy in the Bay Area this year and has brought in 20-year West Coast acquisitions vet Peter Mette to take its local presence to the next level. We caught up with the newly minted director of acquisitions to talk strategy.

Peter (here with wife Melanie) tells us the company sees tremendous opportunity in the Bay, where industrial properties are selling and leasing quickly with upward momentum on prices and rents. Westcore has allocated more than $400M to its acquisition program this year, with a heavy focus on Silicon Valley. Westcore's most recent buy: a 234k SF industrial building bought from Michael Hornstein for $13.85M at 727 Kennedy St in Oakland. Peter says the firm also has looked to the peripheral communities of Fremont and Union City as Palo Alto and Mountain View have approached or surpassed the high-water mark of 2006. The Bay Area real estate investment market has always been competitive, but he says the market is more challenging to compete in than it's ever been.

This year, Westcore bought a new 165k SF office and data center site in Sunnyvale (pictured) for $52.7M. Other current and planned projects in the immediate Silicon Valley area include the 105k SF Chefs’ Warehouse (1250 Whipple Rd) in Union City; the Central Pacific and Central Plaza Class-A warehouse/distribution properties it's building to suit in Union City (1550 Pacific and 3306-33580 Alvarado Niles Rd); and a 550k SF R&D campus in Milpitas.