Space is priced at 60 cents to 75 cents a square foot at the $54 million Speedway Commerce Center II. Photo by Gary Thompson.

Harsch Investment Properties has completed construction of the $54 million Speedway Commerce Center II at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway, bringing another 523,000 square feet of industrial warehouse space to the Speedway submarket.

John Ramous, vice president of operations for Harsch in Las Vegas, said he expects to receive the certificate of occupancy for the eight buildings late this month. TWC Construction, which built Cheyenne Commerce Center and Henderson Commerce Center for Harsch, was general contractor.

"We're excited about it," Ramous said. "With the development we've been involved with in the past, it's just a different product type from Speedway I."

Harsch bought the 95-acre, 1.4 million-square-foot Speedway Commerce Center from Bruton Smith, chairman of Charlotte, N.C.-based Speedway Motorsports, for $44 million in 2001. Shelby Automobiles is the primary tenant there with 140,000 square feet.

It's among numerous acquisitions that Portland, Ore.-based Harsch has made in Las Vegas over the past 10 years, putting 6.5 million square feet in its portfolio. The company built another 1 million square feet of industrial space in the market.

"Forever we will have the least-priced product in the valley," Harsch acquisitions director Ed Borst said. "We bought at $32 a square foot at the speedway. Remember, it was in the middle of nowhere at that time. I had to convince Jordan (Schnitzer, principal of Harsch) to buy it."

With 900 acres around the Interstate 15-Las Vegas Beltway interchange in North Las Vegas and another 300 acres of county land in that area, the Speedway submarket will experience the most robust industrial growth of any part of the valley, Ramous said. Land prices are $8 to $10 a square foot there, compared with $20 to $25 a square foot in the southwest valley, he said.

"Because of pricing, you don't have one area like that that lends itself to industrial development," he said.

CB Richard Ellis broker Jeremy Green said Harsch's portfolio is a good indicator of the demand for "flex incubator" space, a mix of industrial and office use usually 3,000 square feet or less occupied by small businesses such as automobile custom shops. Space is priced at 60 cents to 75 cents a square foot at Speedway Commerce Center II.

NAME CHANGE: Before it even began construction, the Aquitania luxury condo project planned for the northeast corner of Bonanza Road and Main Street has changed its name to Verge.

A property profile from Nevada Title Co. shows the 30,942-square-foot parcel at 634 N. Main St. transferred ownership in September from A.O. Bonanza Holdings to Aquitania Corp., both businesses with the same address in West Hollywood, Calif. The price was $2.8 million. The seller provided a conventional fixed-rate loan in the amount of $2.6 million.

Because it was a business reorganization, no real property transfer tax was paid.

Darren Dunckel, president of Aquitania, told the Review-Journal in June that he had filed a tentative map with the city of Las Vegas seeking approval of 296 units in eight stories with two levels of underground parking. The first floor would have 35,000 square feet of retail space.

Lofts ranged from 825 square feet for one-bedroom units to 1,600 square feet for three bedrooms and were selling from the low $200,000s.

RETAIL CENTER: Las Vegas-based Juliet Cos. opened the 600,000 square-foot Blue Diamond Crossing shopping center at Blue Diamond Road and Valley View Boulevard in the southwest Las Vegas Valley. The development is valued at more than $120 million.

National retailers that have opened at Blue Diamond Crossing include Target, Kohl's, Ross, Office Depot, Cost Plus World Market, Petco and Rack Room Shoes.

INDUSTRIAL LEASES: Greg Tassi of CB Richard Ellis represented TruLogistics in the $1 million, three-year lease of a 63,000-square-foot industrial building from Panattoni Investments at 4780 N. Lamb Blvd.

Geoffrey West and Jeremy Green of CB represented the buyer, JMK Limited Partnership, in the $6.5 million purchase of a 46,000-square-foot industrial building at 955 Grier Drive.