Crown Realty Partners has sold a mid-rise office property in Mississauga’s Airport Corporate Centre just over a year after acquiring it in an off-market transaction.

Colliers brokered the sale of the five-storey, 108,218-square-foot office building on 3.85 acres of land at 5750 Explorer Dr. to a private investor that operates transportation company Hunter Express for $22.8 million. That’s 32 per cent more than what Crown paid for it, according to Colliers Canada senior vice-president Nicholas Kendrew.

“They previously bought another asset I sold a long time ago at 6345-6375 Dixie Road, which is an office complex near the airport,” Kendrew told RENX about the purchaser.

“Despite the marketing materials being focused on owner-occupier buyers, who we've seen paying a premium for properties with vacancy, they were looking at this more as a private investment — not as an owner-occupier — which was a surprising turn for us.”

The property went on the market in the spring of 2025 and Kendrew said there were multiple offers and lots of interest, primarily from private investors and hybrid private investors who were also looking to occupy some of the vacant space. He believes there would be more institutional interest if it was put up for sale now.

What 5750 Explorer Dr. offers

The building is certified LEED Silver and is 75 per cent leased, with the largest tenants including Hershey, Skygrid and BMO. Kendrew said no major changes or upgrades were made to it during Crown’s ownership tenure.

The location is accessible by public transit and is a 10-minute drive from Toronto Pearson Airport. It offers high visibility along Highway 401.

“This is an asset that a lot of commuters in the GTA drive past every day and they see the Hershey sign,” Kendrew said. “It's a great looking asset with a great rent roll and, although it was built in 2007, it’s one of the newest office buildings in the business park.”

The building has four parking spots for every 1,000 square feet and features bicycle racks, showers and electric vehicle charging stations.

“We didn’t see suburban leasing suffer to the same extent during the pandemic and its aftermath that we saw in the downtown area, where you saw vacancy rates climb well into double figures,” Kendrew explained. 

“The Airport Corporate Centre generally ticked away quite nicely, though there have been a few vacancies in the area. Part of the appeal is that it's got the strategic proximity to the airport, but also to a lot of other markets like Mississauga, Brampton and Oakville, where a lot of these high-net-worth private investors live.”

Crown will be active in 2026

Crown, an integrated commercial real estate investment and management firm with a strong focus on value-add opportunities, has more than 10 million square feet of real assets under management in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) and Ottawa. The large majority of that’s in office, and the company remains committed to the asset class.

“We are active participants in the market, buying on the buy side for our fund with capital to invest and selling on the sell side for our fund in disposition mode,” Crown managing partner Emily Hanna wrote in an email to RENX.

“It’s nice to see the market opening, with buyers who see the opportunity in the office assets we stabilize so we can return capital to our investors.

“We’ve been actively seeking office assets and underwriting with real-time data. This drives our conviction in acquiring the right assets where we believe we can add value for our investors.”  

Optimism about office market

Kendrew said he’s “incredibly bullish” about the  prospects for the GTA office market and that he’s more optimistic about 2026 than any of the other 20 years he’s been involved with office property transactions.

“From the financial crisis to 2019, the narrative in the office market in the GTA was that the CBD market — and especially triple-A properties — would perform at the expense of the periphery markets in suburban Toronto,” Kendrew explained. 

“What's happening right now is that good quality assets operated by qualified and experienced managers in the suburbs and downtown are performing well. The great thing about what's occurring this year is that we're seeing a lot of interest from fund advisors that want to step back into the market in both suburban and downtown office properties. 

“Just as there's headwinds for other asset classes, with vacancy rates creeping up and flattening rental rates for industrial and apartments, office is probably the only major asset class where you've got these exceptional tailwinds pushing rental rates.”