Industrial outdoor storage has become a rising star in the UK commercial real estate market. The subsector is attracting institutional capital and has strong demand across a variety of uses, with automobile and heavy goods vehicles parking leading this demand.

Bisnow is holding a fireside chat dedicated to all things IOS at its UK Industrial and Logistics Conference on June 18. It will be led by Cooper-Horowitz Senior Managing Director Justin Horowitz, who leads the CRE capital advisory firm’s IOS platform. Click here to register.

In a conversation with Bisnow, Horowitz shared his team's IOS financing process and what attendees can look forward to at the event and fireside chat.

Bisnow: What does your role at Cooper-Horowitz entail?

Horowitz: I started the IOS platform at Cooper-Horowitz about five years ago, and I lead a team of four people. During this time, we built up a great database of data points we’ve aggregated over the years about the market. My role involves making sure my borrower clients are up to date on all the market intel on the financing side.

A lot of my day-to-day also involves educating senior-level lenders, new equity entrants and existing equity participants on IOS and discussing the deals my team has executed. I also really enjoy the process of marketing transactions and educating lenders on the nuances of each specific deal, walking them through relevant comps, highlighting the strength of the sponsorship and helping frame the story.

Since getting into IOS, my team has financed just over $3.5B across 32 states.

Bisnow: What is your approach to financing IOS?

Horowitz: My process is tight and transparent. We’re putting deals in front of our contacts in the lending space and presenting them with information on our clients’ property or portfolio as well as up-to-date information on IOS. Because I’ve worked on so many IOS transactions over the years, my team is able to work through a lot of the lender Q&A with my clients early in the process, which helps cut down on lender underwriting time.

In the U.S., we’ve seen a lot of institutional equity in the space — discretionary funds, value-add funds and some recent core-plus transactions. We’re now starting to see institutionalisation on the financing market happening in real time. It feels incredibly similar to what happened with self-storage more than a decade ago and with manufactured housing about two decades ago.

We’re in the early innings of IOS where a lot of the value-add aggregators have built these beautiful portfolios, and now there’s a lot of momentum on the financing front. It seems like the next wave will include core buyers, so it feels like there is a lot of runway in the space.

I also make sure my clients know what’s going on daily. We send daily updates to my clients whose deals we’re in the process of financing. I instill in my team the importance of transparency. Transparency is key, and we want our clients to be up to date on the deal flow.

Bisnow: What do you think will be the hottest topics of conversation at the UK Industrial and Logistics Conference?

Horowitz: In the U.S., everyone is talking about data centres and electrified IOS, so I’d love to learn more about if the same conversations are happening in the UK.

I would also love to hear from some of the aggregators in the IOS space and the industrial and logistics space about what they’re thinking in terms of exit plans. In a post-pandemic world, there's been a tremendous amount of aggregation, and value add to stabilisation is occurring in the U.S. right now. I’m curious what that takeout looks like and what are the next steps for a business.

Bisnow: What do you hope attendees take away from the fireside chat?

Horowitz: I hope attendees enjoy the conversation about some of the alternative uses in the industrial and logistics sector. I think there are going to be discussions about some of the equity formation in the space and the debt capital markets in the UK, specifically on the IOS front.

Click here to learn more about Bisnow’s UK Industrial and Logistics Conference on June 18.

This article was produced in collaboration between Cooper-Horowitz and Studio B. Bisnow news staff was not involved in the production of this content.

Studio B is Bisnow’s in-house content and design studio. To learn more about how Studio B can help your team, reach out to studio@bisnow.com.