Expanding pizza chain moves into bigger digs
ABQ-based Pizza 9 leases building with more space, amenities at Vista West in North I-25 corridor
Albuquerque-based Pizza 9 will now be headquartered in a 7,700-plus-squarefoot space at the Vista West building at 5643 Jefferson NE, in the city’s North I-25 corridor. The five-year lease also includes warehouse storage for nonperishable items.
“Vista West provides a great location with easy access for Pizza 9’s growing franchise business, and is especially convenient for its local employees,” said Joe Farr, senior vice president of asset management for Gemini Rosemont, the building owner. “Pizza 9 was attracted by the availability of the clear span warehouse, many amenities, including the on-site café, and the high-visibility building. We truly appreciate having this successful New Mexicobased company as a tenant at Vista West.”
Pizza 9, an Albuquerquebased business that was named one of the top 200 franchises by Franchise Business Review in 2016, now has 20 locations in New Mexico and Texas with expansion plans for Nevada and Oklahoma.
“We chose Vista West for our new headquarters because it will enable us to provide better technology, marketing and other services to our current and future franchisees,” said Hass Aslami, founder and CEO of the business, which was founded in 2008. Its previous office space was 1,500 square feet at Downtown’s Greater Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce building.
Tom Franchini of Colliers International represented Gemini Rosemont in the transaction, while Lori Robertson, also with Colliers, represented Pizza 9.
Vista West is a mixed-use, campus-style, 94,506-squarefoot property offers retail, office and flex/warehouse space. The property is 80 percent leased, with just two suites available, including a 7,074-square-foot suite and an 8,090-square-foot suite.
Tenants include Innovasic, Quell Corp., SWCA Environmental Consultants and Westwind Computer Products Inc., among others.
ABQ construction dinged for walkability
New home construction doesn’t always mean building farther out. Today, some builders and cities are working together to build new homes in areas with high Walk Score ratings.
So which cities are building the most walkable new homes? A recent study by real-estate company Redfin took a look at new homes so far in 2016 and compared the “walk score” of each new home with the citywide walk score. Of the top-ten cities that had a population of at least 200,000, Philadelphia ranked first with 91 percent of new homes having a higher walk score than the citywide score.
In Chicago, Cleveland, St. Petersburg, Fla., Boston and Seattle, more than 80 percent of new homes have a walk score higher than the citywide score.
Greensboro, N.C., Corpus Christi, Texas, and
Albuquerque had the lowest percentages of walkable new home construction. Albuquerque ranked in the 3 percent range for walkable new homes although the citywide walk score stood at 42 percent.
Los Alamos A-OK
Los Alamos has been named the best place to live in the U.S. in 2016 by Niche, an online site that provides rankings, report cards, and reviews of cities, colleges, neighborhoods, and K-12 schools.
The city landed a B- in cost of living, an A and A+ in both public schools and education, an A in jobs and A+ in weather.
“Los Alamos is a large town in New Mexico with 11,843 residents. It has very high home values, average rent costs, and very low unemployment levels. Its citizens generally have very high education levels and very high income levels,” according to the list, which ranked the top 25 municipalities around the country.
Niche bases rankings by gathering data from the U.S. Census Bureau,FBI and other organizations. Factors considered include grades based on cost of living, education, public schools, real estate, diversity, health and fitness, nightlife, shortest commute, crime and safety, family amenities, jobs, outdoor activities and weather.