Industrial REIT, CalSTRS Form JV

First Industrial Realty Trust, a Chicago-based real estate investment trust, has formed a joint venture with the California State Teachers' Retirement System to invest up to $950 million in industrial properties nationwide.The joint venture, which has a five-year time horizon, is expected to have a capitalization of 35% equity and 65% debt, including $300 million in equity from CalSTRS and $33 million in equity from First Industrial, the REIT said. "This joint venture provides us greater capacity to expand our share of the most lucrative part of the industrial real estate business, the development and repositioning of corporate real estate assets," said Mike Brennan, First Industrial's president and chief executive officer. First Industrial is selling about $86 million of unimproved land and buildings that require repositioning to seed the venture, for which JPMorgan Chase has provided a $100 million credit facility, First Industrial said.