This Week's Chicago Deal Sheet

Another Chicago packaging plant — the second in one week — will be closing its doors by the end of the year, according to a notice filed with the Illinois WorkNet Center.

Atlanta-based WestRock Co. will shutter its 9540 South Dorchester Ave. location, cutting 73 positions effective Nov. 30, the company said in a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification filing late last week. The paper and packaging producer makes folding cartons at the 1970s-era Dorchester Avenue facility, per its website, which listed five other WestRock locations within 25 miles of the city.

The plant closure is part of an ongoing effort to boost efficiency, WestRock Senior Manager of Corporate Communications Robby Johnson told Bisnow in an email. Since rolling out its footprint optimization strategy early this year, the company has closed plants in Tacoma, Washington; North Charleston, South Carolina;…

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If the third time really is the charm, that’s news to Jon Boyajian. The Echo Real Estate Capital principal had to call 39 banks to get funding for an Indiana medical office asset the group acquired, underscoring how challenging the current environment is to secure medical office financing. 

Headwinds are as sharp for medical office as any other asset class these days. And while industry players remain optimistic about its performance and potential compared to traditional office and other CRE problem children, it is still getting tougher out there, according to panelists at Bisnow's Chicago Healthcare Summit Sept. 26 at the Mag Mile Medical Pavilion.

With financing hard to come by, the historically stable medical sector has seen transaction volume fall sharply. Tougher margins are bumping rents higher and convincing more developers and occupiers their best bet now is renovating older properties, not taking on new ones.

As for Boyajian’s Indiana deal, he ended up getting financing from a local credit union that was familiar with the property. But that wasn’t as easy as it once was. “I really had to scrape the barrel to get even three term sheets,” Boyajian said. “So [it’s] certainly a challenging environment…

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In Case You Missed It...

Wall Street landlords are eyeing the build-to-rent space as a means of padding their bottom lines amid a housing shortage and elevated mortgage rates that are stymying their ability to buy existing homes.

Single-family rental investors have spent the last few years capitalizing on the nation’s growing need for housing by scooping up thousands of individual homes and turning them into rentals. But as it becomes more difficult to amass inventory, some are looking to create homes where there weren’t ones before.

“Purchasing one-offs from the MLS is really hard right now because there is just no new resale supply,” said Danielle Nguyen, vice president of research for John Burns Research and Consulting. “Groups are pivoting to BTR or buying from builders as an opportunity to grow their portfolios.”

Earlier this summer, American Homes 4 Rent entered a $625M joint venture aimed at constructing and operating newly built rental homes, 20% of which the firm would own, per GlobeSt.  Pretium Partners inked  a $1.5B deal to acquire about 4,000 finished and unfinished homes…

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