Jun 2025
Self-storage market shows strong growth in 2025
The self-storage sector is proving to be a robust asset class for commercial real estate (CRE) investors. Last year alone, the sector generated $3 billion in sales, and there were more than 800 property transactions, representing 51 million square feet of storage space, according to an April article from StorageCafe.
Record-breaking deals in 2024
Last year witnessed a slew of self-storage acquisitions:
- Prime Group Holdings invested $264 million in self-storage facilities.
- Carlyle Group — one of the world’s largest private equity firms — expanded its self-storage portfolio by acquiring $178 million in properties.
- StrategicREIT invested over $131M in self-storage assets.
- Extra Space Storage, which owns over 3,500 self-storage facilities across the country, spent $160 million on acquisitions.
U.S. cities leading the self-storage sector
Urban markets dominated the self-storage market in 2024. The top 10 U.S. cities in 2024 for self-storage sales include:
- Queens, New York
- Cerritos, California
- Miami, Florida
- Brooklyn, New York
- Delray Beach, Florida
- Portland, Oregon
- Riverside, California
- Sebastopol, California
- Salem, Oregon
- Cape Coral, Florida
However, in 2025, Seattle is leading in self-storage sales nationally. In fact, Extra Space Storage strengthened its presence in the city’s metro area with a $29 million acquisition of a 94,000-square-foot facility.
This deal is the second-highest price per square foot among January transactions in the storage space market. StorageCafe cites limited residential and commercial spaces and escalating property values as drivers for sector growth in Seattle. These and other major self-storage transactions at the beginning of 2025 set an optimistic outlook for the sector for the rest of the year.
