New Vegas Center Sold As SoHo

When it opens in September 2008, some 60 or 70 restaurants and retailers will fill 300,000-sf of built-to-the-sidewalk restaurant and retail space stretching 1,500 feet along Las Vegas Boulevard. Most of not all of them will be new to the market.With the process of filling those spaces only in the letter-of-intent stage, that's about all the players are willing to reveal at this point. Jim Reding, director of retail for the developer, 3700 Associates LLC, and Frank Volk, an executive vice president of leasing agent Robert K. Futterman & Assoc., are providing sound bites not names at this point."The Cosmopolitan represents a new era for Las Vegas retail," says Volk. "We think we're going to be riding the tip of the wave."

"We're not going after the high-end shoppers," says Reding. "Our retailers will have merchandise that you can actually buy.""Being the Cosmopolitan, it's all about style and that international feel," he adds. "In a word, it will be swanky."

When pushed, Reding has described the planned retail as being "a funky mix of retailers that is more Soho than Madison Avenue."

The rent could be comparable, however. Local sources tells GlobeSt.com that the going lease rate for ground-level retail space on the Strip is in the high $100s- to low $200s per sf on an annualized basis, or about $1 million per year for a 5,000-sf space.

Above and behind the retail will be 3,000 hotel and condominium units, a 75,000 sf casino, an 1,800-seat theater, 150,000 sf of meeting space, multiple night clubs, a five-acre "beach club" and a 3,800-space underground parking garage. In total, there will be 4 million sf of development.

3700 Associates partnership is led by Miami and New York City developer Ian Bruce Eichner. Eichner most recently opened the Continuum on South Beach, a luxury condominium project in Miami's trendy South Beach area that achieved record sales per square foot. Eichner's partner is gaming developer David Friedman, who helped finance and develop The Venetian and led it owner's successful effort to secure a coveted gaming license in Macau, China.

Their money partner is an affiliate of Dune Capital Management LP, which is controlled by Steven Mnuchin, the former CEO of SFM Capital Management LP, a Soros Fund Management LLC affiliate and investment advisor to Soros Credit and SFM Capital). Dune provided the majority of the capital to, and is the Managing Member of, 3700 Associates LLC.