Westwood Cracks Dallas Market With $22M Las Colinas Buy

"We are thrilled to have bought a true class A property located in one of Dallas' best trade areas," Joe Dykstra, Westwood's executive vice president, said in a press release. The 93%-leased center sits in a one-mile trade area with an average annual household income of $118,000.

Westwood was one of 20 hoping to close the deal, which delivered $20.6 million in net proceeds to the REIT. Not only was the asset labeled non-core, but it also was able to be sold at long last after breaking away from a cross-collateralization that kept the property tied up since the Fort Worth-based REIT's formation in the early 1990s. Keira B. Moody, Crescent's vice president of investor relations, says the high prices for good retail product and the non-core ranking in an office portfolio drove the decision to sell.

Ken Shulman, executive vice president of investment sales in the Southwest for Dallas-based Staubach Co., says the listing came to market 75 days ago without a minimum ask and closed 45 days after Crescent selected the winner of a hotly pursued, infill property at 4000-4040 N. MacArthur Blvd. in Las Colinas. The center was developed in 1987 on a 13.1-acre tract in a neighborhood bordering single-family homes with price tags upward of $1 million. "Coupled with that location, you just can't duplicate it," Shulman tells GlobeSt.com, noting the property abuts the Four Seasons Hotel & Resort, home of the Byron Nelson PGA Tournament. He and Staubach's John Hammill brokered the sale for Crescent Real Estate Funding II LP.

Dykstra says Westwood, one of the largest owners in the Western US of grocery-anchored retail, is "aggressively pursuing additional investments in Dallas" and elsewhere in Texas. According to Shulman, Westwood has sold a number of California centers in 40,000-sf range and is shopping Texas and Florida with the capital. The 2004 plan is to buy a handful of well-located, grocery-anchored centers.

Las Colinas Plaza is anchored by a Tom Thumb flagship store, one of three such designations in Dallas/Fort Worth. Just last year, Tom Thumb signed 10-year lease on the heels of an extensive renovation. The center's other tenants include Blockbuster, Sonny Bryan's Smokehouse and World Savings.