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WILLINGBORO, NJ-Cherry Hill, NJ-based developers Keith and Roy Ludwig acquired Village Mall, a vacant, 220,000-sf shopping center on Route 130 here, according to a published report. The seller was Scott H. Plapinger, a Trenton, NJ-based developer with interests in retail properties in New Jersey and Florida.

The sale price has not been disclosed, and the parties could not be reached for comment. However, Jeff Swartz, executive director of the Camden County Improvement Authority, confirmed that the property has changed hands. "It's my understanding that the sale has closed," he says.

The Improvement Authority is involved because the property, which was at one time anchored by an Acme supermarket, Thrift Drug and Caldor, is expected to be renovated and repositioned as the new home for up to 40 tenants being displaced from the nearby Pennsauken Mart. As reported by GlobeSt.com, Pennsauken Mart, a 50-year-old retail institution that was more flea market than shopping center, was acquired this past spring by the Improvement Authority for $13.2 million. The seller was EMK Penn Realty, which had owned it since the late 1980s.

Pennsauken Mart's 35-acre site is within a larger 65-acre tract that the county has targeted for a $65 million mixed-use development called the Crossroads, the centerpiece of which would be a 6,500-seat arena that was to be the home of a new minor league hockey team. Pennsauken Mart was slated to be torn down to make way for the project.

But after hiring a consultant to work up the financials for the Crossroads, Improvement Authority officials now say they are more likely to downsize or even scrap their plans, and that an RFP is likely in the offing to get the site redeveloped. In any event, Pennsauken Mart is still expected to be demolished by mid-year.

As far as Village Mall, Plapinger's plan was to spend upwards of $8 million to redevelop it as a new home for Mart tenants, with up to 40 of the latter's 100 or so vendors indicating an interest in taking space in the new location. That task will now fall to the Ludwigs, who have not released any specifics of their plans for the vacant complex and its 28-acre site.

Other issues that need to be sorted out, according to Swartz, are some $1.5 million in fines outstanding by Plapinger involving building code violations, and a $65 million bond issue that's about to run out relating to the Pennsauken Mart site redevelopment. The latter was also to have received $24 million in Casino Reinvestment Development Authority grants, based on its initial size.

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Developers Buy Vacant 220,000-SF Shopping Center

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