HAMPTON, NJ-Pio Costa Enterprises, a Fairfield-based developer of retail centers and luxury homes, has acquired a 38-acre site that is known locally as the "Golden Mile." The seller was an investment group, and the sale price was not disclosed. The sale was brokered by John Schilp, managing member of Schilp & Co., a brokerage firm based in Chester.

The land is currently zoned for retail development, and what Pio Costa Enterprises, a third-generation family-owned company headed by Anthony Pio Costa III, has in mind for its newest acquisition is a shopping center. And while formal plans for the project haven't been announced yet, the proposed center does already have a name, Hampton Square.

According to information provided by Pio Costa Enterprises and listed on the company's website, about 20 acres is buildable and the rear section of the site is being targeted for big-box retail development. The tract, located along Route 206 in Northern New Jersey, also includes a front parcel available for a freestanding restaurant or bank tenant. Existing nearby retailers include Wal-Mart, Home Depot, Lowes, Shop-Rite and A&P, among others. Two auto dealerships lie on either side of the site.

The latest sale transaction also marks the third time that the property has changed hands in the past 20 years, with Schilp & Co. handling all three deals. "We originally sold the land on behalf of an heir of the Ideal Dairy Farms estate to a developer in the mid-1980s," Schilp says. But nothing ever happened with the property, and "when that developer was ready to sell in the early 1990s, he utilized our services and we brokered the sale to an investment group known as Engie Inc.," Schilp continues. "They, too turned to us when they were ready to sell it once again."