The reported shutdown of trucking company Yellow Corp. could flood the industrial real estate market with more than 300 properties the company owns and leases nationwide.

Yellow Corp., based in Nashville, Tennessee, ceased operations on Sunday, according to a statement issued by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, the union that represents some of the company's workers. Yellow employs about 22,000 Teamsters members and has about 30,000 total employees. Yellow has consistently lost money in recent years, saddled by a large debt load and reduced shipping demand, according to media reports.

In addition to a portfolio of thousands of trucks and trailers, Yellow is also a major owner and tenant of truck terminals and warehouses. The company said in its most recent annual report that it owns 166 properties and leases another 142 facilities.

The union said it was notified that Yellow plans to file for bankruptcy. If Yellow files for a bankruptcy court liquidation, the judge could appoint a trustee to manage the sale of company assets, said Andy Gutman, president of Farbman Group, a commercial real estate brokerage in Southfield, Michigan. That includes Yellow’s truck terminals and warehouses.

The trustee “will look to sell those off in a manner that maximizes value,” Gutman told CoStar News. Farbman is not involved in the potential Yellow bankruptcy.

Due to low vacancy rates in industrial real estate, the trustee should be able to obtain high prices, he said. The national vacancy rate for industrial properties is 4.9%, according to CoStar data. That compares to its 20-year average of 7.3%.

“Since there has been … far more demand than supply, this will provide some much-needed opportunity for those seeking options in an environment where there have been limitations on available sites,” Gutman said.

Yellow will likely walk away from its active leases and landlords will be forced to file appearances as creditors in the bankruptcy case, Gutman said.

Yellow had not filed for bankruptcy as of Monday afternoon. Spokesmen for Yellow and the Teamsters did not respond to requests to comment.

Yellow carries freight from multiple customers on the same truck. Its largest customers include Walmart, Home Depot and other retailers.

Outdoor storage facilities have recently garnered interest from investors to hedge against higher interest rates and economic uncertainty. Total sales of truck terminals, a type of outdoor storage facility, reached $1.74 billion last year, according to CoStar data.

Yellow on July 13 received the top price for a truck terminal sale over the past 12 months. It sold a 24,000-square-foot terminal in Compton, California, to Universal Logistics Holdings for $80 million.

Yellow’s owned and leased properties are spread across the country but are concentrated on the East Coast. Its two largest owned properties are a 426-door service facility in Chicago Heights, Illinois, and a 349-door facility near Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Yellow’s other largest owned properties are in Maybrook, New York; Carlisle, Pennsylvania; Cincinnati; Greenville, South Carolina; and Nashville.

Yellow’s largest leased property is at 18298 Slover Ave. in Bloomington, California.

Yellow has come close to collapsing before. The Trump administration provided the company a $700 million bailout loan during the pandemic, saying a Yellow shutdown posed a security threat because of some of the goods it carries, according to Transport Dive, an industry trade publication.

In the first quarter of 2023, Yellow recorded a net loss of $54.6 million, a jump from a net loss of $27.5 million in the same period a year earlier.

Yellow executives have mismanaged the company for years and their malfeasance cost thousands of employees their jobs, Teamsters general president Sean O’Brien said in a statement Monday.

“Yellow has historically proven that it could not manage itself despite billions of dollars in worker concessions and hundreds of millions in bailout funding from the federal government,” O’Brien said.