U-Haul® Holding Company has acquired one of Arizona’s largest skyscrapers with the intention of making 20 E. Thomas Road in Midtown Phoenix the new headquarters for U-Haul International and other subsidiaries of the industry-leading organization.
Purchase of The U-Haul Tower, as it will now be known, was finalized on Dec. 6.
The 548,938-square-foot building reaches 25 floors and 397 feet, making it the tallest high-rise outside of Downtown Phoenix (trailing only the Chase® Tower and U.S. Bank® Center in the state). Previously coined the CenturyLink® Tower, The U-Haul Tower was built in 1989.
While plans call for The U-Haul Tower to become the new anchor of the U-Haul Midtown Campus, a thoughtfully planned transition of U-Haul field-support teams to 20 E. Thomas from 2727 N. Central Ave. (one block away) is expected to take place over the next 24 months.
U-Haul, one of Phoenix’s leading employers, has 1,600 Team Members based at its Midtown Campus and more than 34,000 Team Members across its North American network. Find U-Haul careers at uhauljobs.com.
“Our eventual move to the tallest building in Midtown Phoenix is both symbolic and substantive. It reflects the position our team has built as an industry and community leader over the past eight decades,” stated Sam Shoen, Vice Chair of U-Haul Holding Company. “For the past 57 years, U-Haul has been headquartered in Midtown Phoenix. As we look out to the decades to come, The U-Haul Tower will be home to the premier workforce in the Valley.”
U-Haul has been based in Phoenix since 1967, when it relocated from Portland and moved into the distinctive Central Towers, two symmetrical 11-story offices (built in 1959). In 1970, U-Haul opened its Technical Center on South Priest Drive in Tempe, where it continues to research, design, engineer, test and assemble its famous orange trailers, truck boxes, U-Box® portable containers, and other products.
The U-Haul Midtown Campus has grown extensively during the last decade and includes numerous properties lining Roanoke Avenue between Central and 3rd Street. Among those is the 54,208-square-foot Shoen Family Conference and Fitness Center, the country’s premier corporate wellness center and a campus showpiece since 2021. Its opening reaffirmed the Company’s commitment to its Team Members and its long-term investment in the Midtown community.
“I vividly recall when my father relocated U-Haul to Phoenix in 1967,” stated Joe Shoen, Chairman of U-Haul Holding Company. “While our operation was smaller then, our team had a long-term vision for the future. Today, we remain a family-owned and -operated company. This acquisition will help us build on our efficiency at the home office so that we can better support our field teams serving the mobility and storage needs of North America.”
U-Haul services millions of customers annually at 23,000 locations across the U.S. and Canada, with rental sites in every state and province, and offers more than 1 million rentable self-storage units at 2,334 owned-and-operated stores.
Joe Shoen has led the Company’s growth and evolution since 1986. U-Haul was founded by his parents, WWII Navy veteran L.S. Shoen and Anna Mary Carty Shoen, in 1945 in Ridgefield, Wash.
The iconic do-it-yourself moving and self-storage company will mark 80 years of meeting the residential mobility needs of Americans in 2025.
Kidder Mathews broker Ryan Eusticerepresented the buyer, and Cushman & Wakefield brokers Eric Wichterman, Chris Toci and Mike Coover represented the seller in this transaction.
