Canadian Industrial in a Global Portfolio with Bill Bolender of Prologis

Our guest today at the Toronto Real Estate Forum is Bill Bolender, Vice President, Country Manager at Prologis. Prologis is the largest global owner, developer, and operator of industrial properties. Bill has been in charge of their very large Canadian portfolio for 10 years.

With his expertise in industrial, Bill tells us how unique Canada’s assets are in the portfolio of a global company like Prologis. He gives a run down of why industrial has taken off so much since the pandemic began, along with why he doesn’t see the demand ending any time soon.

Topics covered include:

• Is Prologis in the market for land in the current environment?
• Why Bill avoids comparing deals in one country to those in another.
• The tendency in Canada to not sell property during downturns.
• How much inventory a market should be able to absorb each year.
• The increasing size of warehouses being built in the Greater Toronto Area.
• Changes in values of different sectors at the beginning of Bill’s career versus now.
• The factors that have caused industrial to grow so much in the past few years.
• Why land price is the most important variable in the costs of industrial deals right now.
• What the future of multi-storey industrial is looking like.
• If customers in the GTA are interested in renting industrial space above the first floor.
• Being prudent about how your competitors are bidding on sites.
• Searching for opportunities throughout the country.
• Why Bill doesn’t see any relief in sight for vacancy rates.

More about our guest…..

ll Bolender is a Vice President, Country Manager of Prologis. Since starting with Prologis in 2013, Bill has grown the Toronto portfolio from 4 million sq. ft. to 11 million sq. ft. with a further 6 million sq. ft. currently under various stages of development. BIll leads Prologis’ Canadian operations and is responsible for all aspects of Prologis’ platform including; operations, leasing, acquisitions, planning, entitlement and development. Prior to joining Prologis, Bill worked for a major brokerage firm for 15 years focusing on all aspects of industrial real estate across Canada.

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