Regency Centers, H-E-B Team for 136,000-SF Retail Project

The duo has acquired 39 acres at the southwest corner of Woodlands Parkway and Kuykendahl Road in a deal put together in about 60 days, James Buis, managing director in Dallas for the Jacksonville, FL-based Regency Centers, tells GlobeSt.com. He says the firms formed Regency Woodlands/Kuykendahl Retail Ltd. just for the Woodlands project. Buis won't discuss the terms of the agreement, but did say that Regency is the project's general manager.

Buis says the JV's formation's "has allowed us to improve this important relationship" with H-E-B, which is anchoring a wholly owned Regency project in far northwest Houston. The grocer has 80,000 sf in the under-construction 130,000-sf Kleinwood Center.

Construction will begin in May on the JV's Woodlands' project. It has been designed with a 78,132-sf H-E-B store, 57,845 sf of inline space and seven pad sites. Delivery is planned for the second quarter 2004. Pre-leasing will kick off about the same time as construction.

No outside brokers were used to negotiate the land sale. Buis says the price, which is being kept under wraps, was directly negotiated with the seller, the Woodlands Operating Co.

The Woodlands project will take Regency's Houston portfolio to nine grocery-anchored centers. Regency owns four existing centers in the Woodlands, of which three are Kroger-anchored and one's held by Randall's.

According to Buis, the Woodlands plans to build another four or five grocery-anchored centers in its 27,000-acre bounds. Regency, of course, is looking to be the developer. Buis says a new grocery-anchored center has gone up every two years in the master-planned community.