Salt Lake City-based Dakota Pacific Real Estate Partners has acquired Cottonwood Partners, a developer and manager of commercial real estate in the Intermountain West based in Cottonwood Heights. The move expands Dakota Pacific’s total assets under management to $1 billion, with a set of properties built to meet the growing need for quality commercial space in Utah, the company said in a release.
“Utah is one of the fastest-growing states in the U.S.,” said Lane Critchfield, Dakota Pacific CEO. “Accordingly, it is one of the most desirable places to do business. Our investors are looking for ways to gain greater exposer to this market, so the merger made perfect sense. Cottonwood Partners brings a solid set of properties and its proven development and sales team to our growing real estate platform.”
Cottonwood Partners, under the direction of owner John West, developed the Cottonwood Corporate Center in Cottonwood Heights along the I-215 beltway. The project, Critchfield said, was prescient in anticipating the need for high-quality office space in Utah.
“John West was visionary,” Critchfield said. “That land in Cottonwood Heights was a gravel pit. Nobody was looking at the potential for it to become an enterprise hub. John saw that firms coming to Utah were going to be looking for options for Class A office space. He built it and they came.”
The acquisition, which was consummated in late summer, brings the Cottonwood Partners team under the Dakota Pacific umbrella to continue developing current projects, Critchfield said, including the Forge at Geneva, a mixed use commercial office project currently being planned in the Utah County tech corridor.
“This was a synergistic move for all parties and takes advantage of everyone’s strengths,” said West. “Cottonwood’s staff and leadership is delighted to become part of the Dakota Pacific organization and looks forward to an enhanced ability to continue developing leading projects in Utah.”
In the process of the merger, West said, most Cottonwood investors rolled their equity into Dakota Pacific to preserve their investment in Cottonwood’s assets and to enhance and diversify their investment portfolios through Dakota Pacific.
Dakota Pacific is a cash-flow-focused commercial real estate fund that acquires and develops commercial real estate assets throughout the United States.