PHOENIX-Vestar added 1.1 million square feet to its commercial real estate portfolio, having been retained by New York-based Coventry Real Estate Advisors to handle property and marketing management, as well as leasing oversight, for the 50-year-old Christown Spectrum Mall. The new property management company’s goal is to lease up remaining space of the 92% occupied asset, while driving more traffic to the property.

The mall, owned by partners Developers Diversified Realty and Coventry, was managed in-house until by Ohio-based DDR until Jan . 1. At that time, according to Vestar Vice President of Property Management Pat McGinley, the operational activities for the asset fell to the Coventry side of the joint venture.  “They interviewed a number of qualified candidates, and we were honored to be selected as the one who would handle leasing, marketing and property management,” McGinley notes.

The property, located at West Bethany Home Road and North 19^th Avenue, opened in 1961 as the first indoor, air-conditioned mall in Phoenix. Over the years, the mall had fallen onto hard times with anchors leaving. DDR and Coventry acquired the asset in 2004, invested some capital and boosted occupancy.

Ultimately, a local presence will help bring the property the rest of the way. “Our role in this is to capitalize on lessons learned at other assets we manage in this market from a leasing, management and marketing perspective,” McGinley tells Globest.com, adding that there is no significant near-term lease roll. Many of the anchors are under long-term contracts and aren’t going anywhere. Rather, the goal is to lease up the remaining space and to get more shoppers into the mall.

In short, Vestar is interested in implementing a community oriented marketing program to drive traffic, similar to what the company put in place at Desert Ridge Mall in Phoenix and Tempe Marketplace in Temple, AZ, both of which are managed by Vestar. Both of those retail outlets have more than 300 events in a given year, McGinley notes, consisting of local youth organizations, choirs and performances. “We want to bring that concept to Christown, get the community involved and get them reenergized about this asset,” McGinley says.

Meanwhile, there is upside in the space that remains, which McGinley says is inline space located in the interior part of the mall. Part of Vestar’s plan is to upgrade some of the interiors to attract a national or regional soft-good user. Strategic Retail Group is being called in to handle the leasing.

Though Christown Spectrum is an older mall, and though it went through a “down” period that can plague many older retail centers, the asset now seems to be enjoying some popularity among tenants.  Anchor tenants include Walmart, Target, Costco, JCPenney and PetSmart. “It’s an iconic asset in Phoenix,” McGinley comments. “It has a great history; it’s been renovated and updated over the years, and right now, we have a lot of successful anchor tenants.”