The latest 42Floors report takes a closer look at the backbone of our rapidly growing digital economy: data centers. The Phoenix data center market ranks as the No. 5 market by sales volume.

Our team analyzed data center sales activity and construction data from 2012 through 2021 in 90 U.S. markets and ranked the top 20 markets by transactions and development.


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Here are the highlights for the Phoenix data center market:

• Phoenix ranked 5th among the top 20 data center markets by sales volume, with a total of $482.3 million in transactions closed from 2012 through 2021.

• Phoenix also made the list of top 20 data center markets by 10-year growth at #12, with a total of 876,000 square feet of new data center space added since 2012.

• Phoenix was home to two of the largest 20 data center sales of the decade — Landmark Dividend’s $122 million purchase of the property at 4010 North 3rd Street in 2020 (ranked 12) and Apple’s $114 million acquisition of the data center on South Signal Butte Road in 2013 (ranked 14).

For this report, we looked at the backbone of our rapidly growing digital economy — data centers. As the web of devices embedded in our lives and in our economy continues to expand, so does the need to manage the unprecedented flux of information we generate. Consequently, more and more data center space is needed — and digital infrastructure assets have become a hot investment. With that in mind, we wanted to see how U.S. markets had fared during the last decade in terms of data center space. Specifically, our analysis looked at CommercialEdge data center sales and development data from 2012 through 2021 in 90 markets across the U.S. to answer the following:

Which data center properties claimed the highest price tags?

Which markets recorded the highest data center sales volumes?

Which markets led in terms of new data center space construction?

Which were the largest data center markets in the U.S. at the start of 2022?

In broad terms, the data we reviewed showed an estimated growth of 33.4% in new data center space across all of the markets we surveyed during the designated timeframe. More precisely, roughly 40.5 million square feet of new data center space was added from 2012 through 2021. This increased totals from 121.5 million square feet in 2012 to 162 million at the close of 2021. Furthermore, the sales data we looked at revealed that roughly 37 million square feet of data center space had changed hands during that same period for a grand total of about $7.5 billion in sales across all locations we considered for this report.

Visit the methodology section for more details on our analysis and read on for a detailed breakdown of the markets that stood out.