133,088-SF, Grocery-Anchored Center Fetches $19M

DALLAS-Closing out a routine investment cycle, Dunhill Partners has collected $19 million from the sale of a 133,088-sf, grocery-anchored shopping center in the northeast sector. The 97%-occupied asset has no significant roll in leases until 2007.

The Dallas-based Dunhill handed off the deed to Skillman Abrams Shopping Center at 6760 Abrams Rd. to a Boston-based joint venture between Heritage Property Investment Trust Inc. and Intercontinental Real Estate Corp. William Hutchinson, Dunhill's president, confirms more deals are in hand for other shopping centers in its Dallas/Fort Worth portfolio as a three- to five-year investment strategy draws to a close. The sales block includes another grocery-anchored holding at the Skillman-Abrams intersection, where the daily traffic count averages 58,000 vehicles.

The JV assumed a $15-million loan held by Wachovia Bank with nine years left on the term and two years to go before it can be paid off after a face-off with "two or three" other prospective buyers who were ready to pounce at the same price, Adams Howells, a Dallas director for Holliday Fenoglio Fowler LP tells GlobeSt.com. The loan carries a 6.05% fixed-rate interest. "A loan assumption typically takes a lot longer to close, but other than that it was a very smooth transaction," he says.

Howells, teaming with HFF managing director James Batjer, says the class A sale with a high-profile location got an added boost from the "eight or nine years" left on the term of the 78,000-sf grocery anchor, Tom Thumb. As for the balance of the roster, he says there are just a few leases that roll before 2007. Heritage will lease and manage the center, which carries a $23 per sf, triple net rate for the open space.

Howells says the 45-day marketing period drew 15 to 18 offers for the 7.7-acre property. Heritage's track record with HFF and its certainty of close gave it the upper hand when the dust cleared, according to Howells.