Bottom line. Data center prices in 2026 span more than ten times per megawatt. Small leased carrier sites sold for $2 million to $3 million a megawatt, an operating Dallas campus for $9 million, and a Northern Virginia campus leased to three hyperscalers for $27 million. The building is the cheapest part; the tenant and the signed utility contract set the price. The same two-layer rule prices every specialty asset: a cap rate on the contract income, plus or minus what the box is worth to the next operator.
1What traded, and one that went to auction
| Asset | Capacity | Price | Per MW | What set the price |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Converted 1955 telecom building, San Angelo, TX (online auction ended Oct 7, 2026) | 6 MW, 286,000 sq ft | Result not published; an earlier listing asked $10M | — | 6% leased; "approved for 50 MW" is a load study, not a signed service agreement |
| Carrier hotel, Eagan, MN (tenant's purchase option, Q4 2026) | 5 MW, 87,400 sq ft | $9.81M | $1.96M | Sold at the tenant's option price after trading at $9.0M in 2021 and $5.8M in 2015 |
| Colocation site, Franklin, WI (Aug 2026) | 3 MW, 27,000 sq ft | $8.1M | $2.7M | Four carriers on site; capacity quoted as generator nameplate |
| Unfinished campus, Bryan, TX (Chapter 11 sale, July 2026) | 25 acres | $40M | — | $40M against a county filing that claimed $700M of improvements |
| Four-site campus, Dallas-Fort Worth (Mar 2026) | 210 MW | $1.85B | $8.8M | Operating, with land for 150 MW more |
| Three campuses, Northern Virginia, 64% stake (June 2026) | 288 MW | $7.8B gross | $27.1M | 100% leased to three investment-grade hyperscalers |
Sources 1 to 6.
2The market in 2026
| Benchmark | Figure | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Vacancy, primary North American markets | 1.4%, a record low | CBRE H1 2026; Northern Virginia 0.2% |
| Under construction | 7,481 MW, over 80% pre-leased | CBRE; Cushman counts 37.7 GW across the Americas, 91.7% committed |
| Cost to build | $8.9M to $23.3M a MW | Cushman 2026 cost guide; up 21% since late 2024; power gear is 21% of the cost |
| Grid connection wait | Over 4 years in many major markets | JLL 2026 outlook |
| Rents, 250 to 500 kW requirements | $190 to $235 a kW a month | CBRE, Northern Virginia |
| Cap rates, leased hyperscale | 5.1% to 5.6% (reported, not verified in a primary survey) | Industry aggregator, May 2026 |
Sources 7 to 10. In the three sub-10 MW trades we found, the buyers were operators and infrastructure funds; a small buyer's exit is to one of them.
3Specialty property gets two values
A car wash, a cold-storage warehouse, a medical office or a data center is priced in two layers. First, a cap rate on the contract income, which carries the operator's credit as much as the real estate. Second, what the box earns under a new operator if the tenant leaves, less the cost to convert. Where there is no second use, the second layer can be negative and the buyer underwrites to land.
| Asset type | 2026 marker | Second-use risk |
|---|---|---|
| Net-leased car wash | 6.24% cap, January 2026 | High: a tunnel has one use |
| Medical outpatient building | 6.8% to 6.9% cap; $368 a sq ft (Cushman) | Low near a hospital |
| Cold storage | Mid-6% cap on a single-asset sale; the largest public cold-storage company trades at about 8.5% implied | High: the spread between the two caps is the business-value discount |
| Small data center | $2M to $2.7M a MW | Highest: value is the power contract and the carriers, not the shell |
Sources 11 to 13.
4Before you bid on a data center
- The utility letterSigned capacity, substation timing, and whether it transfers on sale. A load study is not a contract.
- Nameplate versus feedWhether the quoted megawatts are utility power or generator capacity.
- Tenants and carriersLease terms, purchase options that cap your exit, cross-connect revenue, carrier count.
- Equipment ageGenerator and UPS test logs, chiller service dates, power usage effectiveness.
- Sunk cost is not valueAn unfinished shell is worth the lesser of what was spent and what power can be delivered.
- Exit buyerName the operator or infrastructure fund that buys it from you.
Sources
- LoopNet, 2701 S Johnson St, San Angelo TX: loopnet.com
- DataBank MSP2, Data Center Dynamics: datacenterdynamics.com
- Franklin WI sale, BizTimes via Wisconsin Technology Council: wisconsintechnologycouncil.com
- RELLIS campus sale, Law360 and KBTX: kbtx.com
- KKR DFW portfolio to DigitalBridge: datacentres.com
- Blackstone Northern Virginia stake sale: stblaw.com
- CBRE North American data center demand, H1 2026: cbre.com; Global Data Center Trends 2026
- Cushman & Wakefield 2026 data center cost guide, via CRE Daily: credaily.com; Americas development via IREI
- JLL 2026 global data center outlook, via Data Center Frontier: datacenterfrontier.com
- Cap rate aggregator, May 2026 (unverified against a primary survey): datacentres.com
- Car wash net lease, Connect CRE: connectcre.com
- Medical outpatient, CBRE Q1 2026: cbre.com; Cushman H1 2026
- Lineage Q4 2025 call (Santa Maria sale): finance.yahoo.com
Per-megawatt figures are DHI Capital's arithmetic from the published prices. Not investment advice.
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