Copyright Baton Rouge Advocate
A group of local investors led by commercial real estate broker Richard Juge has purchased the 6.6-acre Elmwood Oaks office park, a campus-style complex of four, one-story buildings on the site of the old Elmwood Plantation near River Road. Juge, who owns REMAX Commercial Brokers, declined to say how much the group paid for the property, which was listed for sale earlier this year for $5 million by its longtime owner Vincent Saia. But Juge said the group plans to spend more than $1 million renovating the buildings, which were built in 1980. “They need some TLC and a little updating,” he said. “But it’s a fabulous location under 300-year-old live oaks.” Three of the four buildings are more than 90% leased. A fourth building, totaling 27,000 square feet, has been vacant since the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality moved out last year. The purchase is the latest of several investments in the Jefferson Parish industrial corridor, which is evolving into one of the fastest growing submarkets in the metro area, with a mix of industrial, commercial and retail space with a major new multifamily project underway. Among the recent developments at Elmwood was Reily Foods Co.’s relocation late last year of its corporate headquarters from a Poydras Street high-rise to a building on Commerce Road West near the Huey P. Long Bridge. Earlier this fall, Intralox, a division of Laitrim Corp., unveiled a new 17,000-square-foot expansion on its campus that will house a food processing training center. Juge said those factors, as well as other nearby investments — Ochsner Health’s construction of a new children’s hospital building on its Jefferson Highway campus and the development of a subdivision with 100 single-family homes at the former Colonial Golf and Country Club in nearby Harahan — make Elmwood an attractive area for office space, as well as for the industrial properties for which it is better known. “The big picture is, 20 or 30 years ago you’d put your office at Elmwood if you had to,” said Juge, who plans to relocate his real estate brokerage office from Metairie to Elmwood Oaks. “Now, you want to put your office there.” 'Alternative to Metairie' Though Elmwood was developed initially as an industrial area with warehouses and “flex” space, its handful of office buildings have high occupancy rates, in part due to large institutional tenants that tend to have long-term leases. The average occupancy rates for Elmwood’s eight office buildings averaged nearly 93% in 2024. By comparison, the pricey East Metairie market, which includes the Galleria and Lakeway towers, averaged 85%, while occupancy in downtown New Orleans high rises hovered around 80%, according to Corporate Realty’s Office Report. Corporate Realty broker Joe Gorman said a more significant driver behind the strength of the Elmwood office market is its price point. Elmwood’s office stock, though slightly older than Metairie’s newest “class A” buildings, lease, on average, for about $19 per square foot. Metairie’s class A towers, by comparison, are the steepest in the market, averaging more than $25 per square foot, while older buildings in Metairie go for about $20 per square foot on average. “For those who want to be in Jefferson Parish, it’s an alternative to Metairie,” Gorman said. “When Lakeway is $26 a foot, Elmwood looks attractive.” Jefferson Parish Economic Development Commission President and CEO Jerry Bologna believes the continued growth of the area at a time when other parts of the metro area are stagnating also accounts for interest in Elmwood office properties. “We have seen some organic change in the makeup from a warehousing and logistics hub to more commercial, retail and office use,” he said. “It’s developing as a community within a community.” In Baton Rouge, the industrial and mixed-use office properties in the Industriplex corridor off Siegen Lane, which is lined with strip malls and big-box retailers, have benefited in a similar way, according to commercial broker Grey Mullins.
