On July 24, 2026, an e-commerce company took possession of the former New York Times distribution site at 28-10 Whitestone Expressway in College Point. The lease covers the whole property. Terreno Realty describes it as an 81,000-square-foot cross-dock building with two more floors of indoor parking on 4.0 acres. The initial term runs to July 2029.
That one lease carries much of the Queens industrial story for Q3 2026. Borough vacancy fell 50 basis points to 6.1%, the largest move among the outer boroughs, and the quarterly market tally lists the College Point deal as a 245,337-square-foot lease, the biggest signed anywhere in the outer boroughs this year. About two-thirds of that floor area is parking deck. Anyone pricing Queens industrial off the vacancy headline is pricing demand for vehicle storage, and in this case that demand is signed for three years with an exit clause.
What 245,337 square feet holds at College Point
When Wildflower Ltd. took title in March 2025, Crain's described the building as having 80,612 square feet at ground level and 159,656 square feet on levels two and three. The construction financing, which closed in 2023, described the project as a warehouse with a structured parking facility and 81,000 rentable square feet of industrial space. Terreno's filings now report the property at 81,000 post-development square feet and 100.0% leased. The upper two levels are where the vans go.
College Point is not the only example. Other Queens logistics assets that sold or refinanced this year share the same profile:
| Property | Total area | Vehicle component | 2026 event |
|---|---|---|---|
| 28-10 Whitestone Expressway, College Point | 245,337 sf | Two indoor parking floors above an 81,000 sf cross-dock | Full-building e-commerce lease from July 24, 2026 |
| 153-44 South Conduit Ave, Springfield Gardens | 116,725 sf | 55,300 sf underground parking garage beside 61,425 sf of storage | Sold to Prologis for $49 million in September |
| 58-80 Borden Ave, Maspeth | 146,583 sf IOS site | Outdoor storage around 26,619 sf of building | $39.4 million refinancing in October |
The South Conduit Avenue building near JFK opened in 2023. Its tenants are Luxury Portable Toilet Rentals of New York and home inspection service Dry as a Bone, Commercial Observer reported. Sitex Group's Borden Avenue yard in Maspeth sits next to the Long Island Expressway. The New York City Fire Department signed a 20-year lease there in February 2023 for a garage and repair facility, according to Commercial Observer. Across the outer boroughs, 11 acres of parking were leased in Q3 2026.
The fleets on Review Avenue tell the same story
Innovo Property Group's Review Avenue Complex at 28-90 Review Avenue in Long Island City is a 652,000-square-foot vertical industrial building with clear heights up to 32 feet and drive-up access and loading on every floor. It signed four leases totaling 350,000 square feet within about three months of finishing construction, Bisnow reported in September 2026.
The tenant list is mostly fleet operators:
- Edge Auto Rental, a car rental firm, took 78,000 square feet on the ground floor.
- 1-800-GOT-JUNK?, a same-day junk removal service, took 41,000 square feet on the ground and third floors.
- Roadway Moving, a moving and storage company, took 117,000 square feet on the first floor.
- Contenur, a Spanish maker of urban waste container systems, took 114,000 square feet on the second floor.
Bisnow noted that vertical warehouses like this one were planned during the pandemic-era industrial boom and then leased slowly for years. What finally filled Review Avenue was a set of businesses that need to park, load and dispatch vehicles close to Manhattan and Brooklyn. Multi-level drive-up access suits them more than it suits a parcel sortation operation.
The borough numbers once you take out one building
Queens covers 805 buildings and 57.3 million square feet of industrial inventory. It posted 288,254 square feet of net absorption in Q3 2026. The College Point lease alone is 245,337 square feet. Without it, the borough's best quarter of 2026 would have been close to flat. Year to date through Q3 2026, Queens net absorption is still negative at 348,808 square feet.
Rents point the same way. Queens overall net asking rent was $28.77 per square foot in Q3 2026, down $0.64 from Q2 2026 and $0.83 from Q3 2025, which works out to roughly 2.2% and 2.8%. Warehouse and distribution asking rent fell to $28.87. High-tech and flex held at $29.21, unchanged from Q2 and up from a year earlier. Rent cuts are hard to square with genuinely tight space. They fit better with a market where a few large blocks got leased to vehicle-heavy users while the rest of the stock still competes on price.
The long-term scarcity case rests on supply. As of Q3 2026, Queens has no industrial space under construction. That empty pipeline helps explain why institutional buyers keep buying here while rents slip.
What the yield math says about the College Point tenant
Terreno paid about $92.0 million for 28-10 Whitestone Expressway on February 18, 2026. The building was a vacant shell at the time. Terreno estimated a total investment of $103.4 million and a 5.4% stabilized cap rate. After signing the lease, it revised those figures to $98.8 million and 6.4%.
Terreno defines the cap rate as stabilized cash net operating income divided by total cost. On that basis, its own numbers imply stabilized income rising from about $5.6 million to about $6.3 million a year. Spread over all 245,337 square feet, $6.3 million is roughly $26 per square foot, close to the Queens warehouse asking rate. Spread over the 81,000 square feet of industrial floor, it is roughly $78. This is rough arithmetic on estimated stabilized income, and Terreno has not disclosed the lease rent. Even so, by the owner's own estimate, a building that is mostly parking produces income per gross foot close to Queens warehouse asking rates.
The lease terms show what kind of commitment stands behind that income. Terreno's July 27, 2026 release states:
"The tenant has four renewal options; the first for ten years and the three subsequent options for five years each. In certain circumstances the tenant may terminate the lease with six months notice during the initial three-year term."
So the tenant holds the long-term option: up to 25 more years if it renews, or departure on six months' notice in certain circumstances if it does not. Short terms show up elsewhere in Terreno's Queens book too. Its Q3 2026 update lists an early renewal of 34,000 square feet in Jamaica with a logistics and transportation services provider, starting November 1, 2027 and ending October 2029. The FDNY's 20-year commitment at Borden Avenue is the kind of term these assets rarely get.
Terreno is also buying at yields not far above long-term borrowing costs. On October 20, 2026 it bought 43-22 55th Avenue in Maspeth, a vacant 29,000-square-foot building on 1.4 acres with 24 grade-level loading positions, for about $13.9 million at an estimated 6.3% stabilized cap rate. That is about $479 per square foot of building for a site whose value sits mostly in its loading doors and yard near the BQE and LIE interchange. The 10-year Treasury moved above 5% in September 2026, and the Federal Reserve raised rates on September 16. A REIT that raises equity can live with that spread. A mid-market buyer on floating-rate debt has much less room.
The price history that gets repeated
The College Point sale is often told as a quick gain: Wildflower bought for $35 million in 2025 and sold for $92 million a year later. The Times leased the site to Adam Gordon about three years before the 2025 deed so construction could begin. The $35.8 million deed transfer came after the warehouse was finished. In 2023, the project, a joint venture with Drake Real Estate Partners, closed a $94 million floating-rate construction loan from PIMCO and a $49 million equity placement. The $92 million sale price is below the construction loan by itself.
At South Conduit Avenue, Wildflower refinanced with a $48.1 million Barings bridge loan in June 2025 and sold to Prologis for $49 million in September 2026. In both cases, a developer that built a vehicle-heavy asset sold it to a REIT with a lower cost of capital. At College Point, Terreno bought a vacant shell and took on the lease-up itself. Taken together, the two trades show that in Queens, delivering the building and getting it leased can be valued very differently.
Questions to settle before pricing a Queens industrial asset
What share of the square footage is parking or yard? A building marketed at a large gross figure may have far less rentable industrial floor. Compare offered rents against the industrial area and against the gross area, and see which comparable each one actually matches.
What do the tenants run? On Review Avenue, the tenants include a car rental firm, a junk removal service and a moving company. Their demand depends on route density and fleet size, and those can shift faster than a warehouse operator's inventory.
How long is the term, and who can end it? A full-building lease with a three-year initial term and a tenant termination right is underwritten very differently from a 20-year municipal garage lease, even when both appear as occupied space in the quarterly numbers.
What does the spread look like on your financing? A 6.3% to 6.4% stabilized yield works for an equity-funded REIT. Check it against your own debt before treating REIT pricing as your comparable.
FAQ
Is Queens industrial vacancy actually tightening? Vacancy fell to 6.1% in Q3 2026. Year-to-date net absorption through Q3 is still negative, and asking rents fell over both the quarter and the year. The quarter's gain came mostly from one large College Point lease.
Why do institutions keep buying here if rents are falling? Queens had no industrial space under construction in Q3 2026, and the newest assets lease to fleet operators that need sites close to the city. Prologis and Terreno both bought in 2026 on that basis.
Does a tenant termination clause change valuation? It changes how much of the income counts as contracted. Lease terms vary, so this post is general information and not legal, tax or financial advice. Confirm the details of any specific lease with your attorney and lender.
Tide Realty Group underwrites Queens industrial assets the way they actually lease. We split rentable floor from parking and yard, review each tenant's term and exit rights, and test yields against your own capital stack before an offer goes out. If you hold a fleet-heavy building or are pricing one, bring us the rent roll. Rise With Us.
