The Ascent Commerce Center in Commerce City. (Courtesy Ambrose)
Advance Auto Parts is parking in Commerce City.
The publicly traded car parts retailer signed a seven-year lease in December for 178,000 square feet at 17956 E. 84th Ave. in Commerce City, building owner Ambrose confirmed to BusinessDen.
It was the largest industrial lease in the Denver metro area in the fourth quarter of 2025, according to real estate brokerage CBRE.
Advance Auto Parts declined to comment. The publicly traded company has nine stores in Denver and seven in Aurora, according to its website.
The new space is at the Ascent Commerce Center, a three-building industrial development on 33 acres that is also home to PCL Construction and La-Z-Boy. Ambrose, an industrial investor out of Indianapolis, Indiana, purchased the real estate in 2024 for $61 million, according to public records. There’s still 150,000 square feet of vacant space within the 600,000-square-foot development.
Ryan Almaleh, industrial broker with Avison Young, said the market for enormous warehouses has slowed in the metro area. He inked the second-largest lease of last quarter at 150,000 square feet, working with tenant Pretred, a startup that turns old tires into rubber barriers.
“If you signed a lease five years ago, and you’re coming to market now, you’re probably crying as a tenant,” he said.
CBRE notes that average asking rents sit at $10.06 per square foot, up 4.8% year-over-year. Total availability, the amount of space available for lease or sublease, is at 9.8%, up from 9.3% compared with the fourth quarter of 2024.
Almaleh said that expenses paid by tenants, like property taxes and insurance, have basically doubled over the past five years, making Colorado a harder sell for out-of-state companies looking to establish a presence here. And existing tenants are signing shorter leases for smaller spaces to stay lean amid rising uncertainty about prices in the market.
“Landlords are holding firm at base rates that were underwritten in 2022 or ’23, and that’s just not the reality of the world anymore,” Almaleh said.
The Ascent Commerce Center in Commerce City. (Courtesy Ambrose)
Advance Auto Parts is parking in Commerce City.
The publicly traded car parts retailer signed a seven-year lease in December for 178,000 square feet at 17956 E. 84th Ave. in Commerce City, building owner Ambrose confirmed to BusinessDen.
It was the largest industrial lease in the Denver metro area in the fourth quarter of 2025, according to real estate brokerage CBRE.
Advance Auto Parts declined to comment. The publicly traded company has nine stores in Denver and seven in Aurora, according to its website.
The new space is at the Ascent Commerce Center, a three-building industrial development on 33 acres that is also home to PCL Construction and La-Z-Boy. Ambrose, an industrial investor out of Indianapolis, Indiana, purchased the real estate in 2024 for $61 million, according to public records. There’s still 150,000 square feet of vacant space within the 600,000-square-foot development.
Ryan Almaleh, industrial broker with Avison Young, said the market for enormous warehouses has slowed in the metro area. He inked the second-largest lease of last quarter at 150,000 square feet, working with tenant Pretred, a startup that turns old tires into rubber barriers.
“If you signed a lease five years ago, and you’re coming to market now, you’re probably crying as a tenant,” he said.
CBRE notes that average asking rents sit at $10.06 per square foot, up 4.8% year-over-year. Total availability, the amount of space available for lease or sublease, is at 9.8%, up from 9.3% compared with the fourth quarter of 2024.
Almaleh said that expenses paid by tenants, like property taxes and insurance, have basically doubled over the past five years, making Colorado a harder sell for out-of-state companies looking to establish a presence here. And existing tenants are signing shorter leases for smaller spaces to stay lean amid rising uncertainty about prices in the market.
“Landlords are holding firm at base rates that were underwritten in 2022 or ’23, and that’s just not the reality of the world anymore,” Almaleh said.
