Not all square footage is created equal

Price per square foot is the most quoted metric in industrial real estate, and one of the least complete. Two 50,000 square foot buildings can sit a mile apart and lease at very different rates. Location explains part of the gap. Physical specifications explain most of the rest.

If you’re buying, selling, or leasing industrial property in the Sacramento region, these are the features that drive value. They also widen or narrow your pool of users.

Clear height

Clear height is the distance from the floor to the lowest overhead obstruction, usually the bottom of the joists or the sprinkler mains. It sets how high a tenant can safely rack product.

Older buildings commonly have 18 to 24 feet of clear height. New distribution construction typically delivers 32 to 36 feet, and large-format buildings often go higher. Going from 24 to 32 feet often adds a full level of pallet storage across the entire footprint.

For a logistics user, that added cubic capacity often outweighs a lower rent rate. Buildings under 24 feet draw a smaller pool of users, typically owner-users, contractors, and last-mile operators who don’t need the vertical space.

Power capacity

Electrical service rarely appears on a flyer, but it decides whether a building works for certain uses. Cold storage, manufacturing, EV-related operations, and automated fulfillment all draw heavy amperage.

Many buildings from the 1980s and 1990s were designed for light industrial use with modest service, often 200 to 800 amps. Modern distribution and manufacturing users commonly ask for 2,000 amps or more. What you can add depends on what the local utility can deliver to the site, and lead times can run long.

If you own an older building, document the existing service (amperage, voltage, and phase) and disclose it up front. It’s one of the easiest questions to answer before a tenant asks.

Dock doors and truck court depth

Dock-high doors and grade-level doors serve different tenants. A building with a few grade-level doors and no dock package suits a contractor or light manufacturer. A distribution user moving trucks all day can’t operate in it.

A common benchmark for distribution space is one dock-high door per 5,000 to 10,000 square feet, depending on the use. Cross-dock and high-turn operations sit at the more generous end of that range. Buildings with fewer doors than that compete on price.

Truck court depth matters just as much. The industry guideline for 53-foot trailers is a minimum of about 130 feet, with 185 feet preferred for cross-dock and trailer-storage configurations. Shallow yards limit turning radius, trailer staging, and queuing. If you’re repositioning a building, weigh yard depth carefully, even if it costs some building footprint.

Column spacing

Column spacing controls how freely a tenant can lay out racking, production lines, and equipment. Modern distribution buildings typically use bays of 50 by 50 feet or wider, often with a 60-foot speed bay along the dock wall. Older buildings on a 40 by 40 foot grid or tighter cut into racking efficiency.

You can’t move structural columns economically, so the grid is priced into value on day one. Appraisers and underwriters commonly discount buildings with tight grids against comparable buildings with better ones.

Parking ratios

Parking is easy to ignore until a tenant’s headcount doesn’t fit. A ratio of 1 stall per 1,000 square feet is common for warehouse and distribution product. Labor-intensive users like light assembly, fulfillment, and multi-shift operations often need more.

Site plan and zoning requirements for truck circulation, queuing, and parking vary by jurisdiction. Before you commit, confirm what the local jurisdiction requires and what the site can accommodate.

Fire suppression

Under NFPA 13, sprinkler design depends on the stored commodity, the storage height, and the building’s roof and ceiling configuration. Early Suppression Fast Response (ESFR) systems are the standard for high-piled storage in modern distribution buildings.

A building without ESFR may limit the tenant’s storage height or commodity class. Retrofitting can involve new mains, added pump capacity, and sometimes a larger water supply, so cost varies widely by building. If you have high-piled storage needs, identify the existing system type early and get a fire protection engineer’s opinion.

What this means for owners

Lead your marketing materials with the specs users screen on: clear height, power capacity, dock count and ratio, column spacing, truck court depth, and sprinkler type. If a building falls short on one or more, price and position it for the user pool it fits.

What this means for buyers and tenants

Marketing flyers often carry unverified numbers. Clear height may be measured to the deck instead of the lowest obstruction. Power capacity may be assumed. The dock count may include doors that aren’t in service. Independent verification during due diligence is standard practice, and it costs little compared to owning or leasing the wrong building.

Due diligence checklist

1. Measure clear height at the lowest obstruction. Don’t rely on the listing sheet.
2. Confirm electrical service and capacity in writing from the utility or a licensed electrician.
3. Count functional dock doors and measure truck court depth.
4. Verify the sprinkler system type and design criteria against your storage needs.
5. Test your layout against the actual column grid before you sign.

These features drive daily operations, and they drive exit value too. The next buyer or tenant will screen on the same specifications you do today.