If you've been in Denver commercial real estate for any length of time, you've heard some version of this sentence: "I only do industrial" or "I focus exclusively on office." Single-asset specialization is positioned as depth of expertise. And there's truth in that — until the moment your deal has moving parts across more than one asset type, and your broker can't follow you there.
I've spent the last several years doing something most Denver brokers don't: building genuine transaction experience across industrial, retail, and office simultaneously. Not as a generalist who dabbles in everything. As someone who has closed complex deals in all three, understands how they price differently, finance differently, and fail differently — and can tell you which one makes sense for what you're trying to accomplish.
This post is a breakdown of what I've learned. Not a pitch. A real look at how the three asset classes behave in the current Denver market, where the opportunity is, and how to think about each one before you pick up the phone.
"The investor who understands how industrial, retail, and office interact in the same market has an edge most single-asset buyers never develop."
Industrial: The Market Everyone Wants, and What They're Missing
Denver industrial is the darling asset class right now, and for good reason. Vacancy sits around 7%, the I-70 corridor continues to absorb, and cap rates in core locations have compressed to levels that would have seemed aggressive five years ago. If you're an investor, you already know all of this. What you might not know is where the real opportunity is hiding.
The highest-profile industrial listings — well-located, stabilized, 100% leased NNN — are priced efficiently. There's real competition for them and buyers are paying for certainty. That's fine if certainty is what you need. But if you can underwrite risk, the better returns are in the deals that don't look perfect on the surface: functionally obsolete buildings in strong locations, partial-vacancy assets where lease-up assumptions are conservative, or off-market sellers who haven't tested the market yet.
I closed an off-market industrial deal in early 2026 that required navigating a Phase II environmental assessment, restructuring seller financing twice, and staying the course through a process that tested everyone involved. The buyer got a price and a structure that a competitive bid process wouldn't have produced. The seller got outcome certainty and installment treatment on the gain. That deal only happened because both parties understood what they were actually optimizing for — and had representation that could structure around complexity instead of walking away from it.
What buyers should watch in Denver industrial right now: Clear-height requirements are increasing. Buildings under 24' clear are trading at a discount and facing longer lease-up timelines. The I-70 and Northeast corridor remains the tightest submarket. West Denver is undersupplied at the smaller bay end (5,000–15,000 SF). Phase I environmental conditions are common on older industrial — don't let that kill a deal before you understand what you're actually dealing with.
Retail: The Asset Class That Refuses to Die, and Why That's Interesting
The narrative on retail has been wrong for a decade. Not uniformly wrong — regional malls and big-box anchored centers have had real structural problems. But neighborhood retail, strip centers in strong trade areas, and well-located single-tenant net lease? That product has quietly outperformed the obituaries.
In Denver specifically, retail net absorption turned positive in Q1 2026. The experiential and service tenants that have replaced some traditional retail — fitness, medical, food and beverage, personal services — are actually better credit in many cases, because they can't be replaced by Amazon. A dental office or fitness studio doesn't have an e-commerce substitute. That matters for vacancy risk in a way that a traditional soft goods tenant doesn't.
What makes retail complicated is that the underwriting is hyperlocal in a way that industrial and office aren't. A strip center on Colorado Boulevard and a strip center three miles away in a lower-traffic corridor are completely different investments. Co-tenancy matters. Traffic counts matter. The trade area income demographics matter.
What I look for in Denver retail deals: Anchor tenants with genuine traffic-driving ability — not just name recognition. Below-market rents with mark-to-market upside on renewal. NNN or modified gross structures that limit landlord exposure. Trade area demographics that support the tenant category. And parking — Denver retail parking ratios are more constrained than people expect, and that affects which tenants can operate there at all.
Office: The Distressed Asset Class That Serious Investors Should Be Watching
I'll say the quiet part out loud: suburban Denver office is distressed. Vacancy is above 18%, tenants have significant leverage, and a lot of landlords are underwater on assets they bought in a different rate environment. That's a real problem for existing owners. For buyers with a long time horizon and the ability to underwrite lease-up risk correctly, it's a different kind of opportunity.
The comparable — and I mean this seriously — is retail in 2012. The narrative then was that retail was dead. The investors who bought well-located retail at distressed prices and held through the recovery did extremely well. Office won't look exactly like that. But the pattern of distress creating entry points for patient capital is not a new pattern.
The filter I apply to office deals right now: location first, always. Well-located, well-amenitized buildings with access to transit and the kind of environment that actually competes for tenants are holding up. Functional Class B suburban product with no differentiation is struggling and will continue to struggle. Those are different assets and shouldn't be underwritten the same way.
I also pay close attention to lease expiration schedules and roll risk in years 3–5. In a high-vacancy market, you don't want to inherit a building where 40% of the rent rolls in the same 18-month window. The better office buys have staggered expirations and tenants who have renewed at least once — that's a signal of genuine tenant satisfaction, not just lease obligation.
Where I'd look in Denver office right now: Cherry Creek and Lower Downtown have proven resilience — tenants in those submarkets have options and are choosing to stay, which tells you something real. The DTC corridor is bifurcated. The right building in the right location can work. The wrong one is a value trap, and the difference isn't always obvious from the rent roll alone.
Why It Matters to Work With Someone Who Understands All Three
Here's the practical reason this matters beyond theory: investors rarely stay in one lane forever. A buyer who starts with an industrial acquisition often ends up evaluating a retail opportunity when cap rates compress. A family office with office exposure is looking at whether to hold, reposition, or exchange into something else. A 1031 buyer has 45 days to identify and can't afford to be educated on a new asset class in real time.
The other thing: complex deals frequently cross asset class lines. I've worked on transactions where an industrial property had a retail pad site that needed separate underwriting. I've evaluated mixed-use deals where the ground-floor retail and upper-floor office had completely different market dynamics. If your broker only speaks one language, you lose nuance — and in CRE, nuance is usually where the value or the risk is hiding.
I'm not saying single-asset specialists don't have value. They do. But I've built my practice to serve investors and owners operating across the Denver market broadly — because that's who I can serve most completely, and honestly, those are the most interesting deals.
The Conversation Worth Having
If you're evaluating a Denver CRE acquisition — industrial, retail, or office — the most useful thing I can offer before anything else is a candid read on whether the deal makes sense. Not a pitch. A real conversation about what you're trying to accomplish and whether the asset you're looking at is the right vehicle for it.
Sometimes the answer is yes. Sometimes it's "the fundamentals are there but the structure needs work." Sometimes it's "this doesn't pencil at the ask and here's why." I'll tell you all three — because the clients who trust me enough to bring me the next deal are the ones who got the honest answer the first time.
Reach out directly: amanda@khcommercial.com or 951-551-2772. First conversation is always free and always candid.
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