Continental Realty Closes $240M Open-Air Retail Fund

The Shoppes at Webb Gin. Image courtesy of Continental Realty Corporation

Continental Realty Corp., of Baltimore, has reached the final closing of its Continental Realty Opportunistic Retail Fund I LP, a close-ended fund focused on neighborhood, grocery-anchored, lifestyle and power centers in the nation’s top 50 Metropolitan Statistical Areas, as well as select secondary markets.

In all, CRC raised $240 million in equity: $200 million in the fund itself and $40 million in two co-investment vehicles.

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Since the fund’s inception in 2021, CRC has acquired nine retail properties totaling nearly 1.9 million square feet; as of now, the fund is more than one-third invested.

Fund acquisitions include:

• Banks Crossing, a 255,101-square-foot regional shopping center in Fayetteville, Ga.
• The Shoppes at Webb Gin, a 330,000-square-foot lifestyle center in Greater Atlanta
• a portfolio of five shopping centers totaling more than 900,000 square feet of space in Illinois, in the Chicago suburbs of Cicero, Mount Prospect, Naperville and Palatine, and acquired for $94 million
• Oakland Plaza and Oakland Square, two shopping centers in Troy, Mich., that total nearly 392,000 square feet

Six of the nine properties are grocery anchored.

CRORF was formed to acquire a diversified portfolio of distressed, opportunistic and value-add retail properties throughout the U.S.

Essential, but costlier

Josh Dinstein, CRC’s senior vice president, acquisitions, said in a prepared statement that the open-air retail asset class remains underappreciated, and that the company intends to deploy capital into a favorable investment environment.

CRC COO David Donato commented that some investors are inclined to exit shopping centers, even though there is a notably different risk profile between malls and strip centers and that today, many would-be market participants are presently sidelined. He added that the fresh infusion of capital will enable the company to pursue open-air retail properties that consistently deliver long-term value.

A spring retail forecast from Colliers describes U.S. consumers as cautiously confident, focusing on bargains as inflation continues to be an issue for many. The effects of inflation can be clearly seen in the grocery category, where the share of consumer spending has barely twitched from 2019 to 2022, even as the actual spend rose nearly 21 percent in the same period.

“Consumers lower their food and grocery expenses by choosing affordable private-label goods and lower-cost brands,” Colliers reported. “A cautious mindset is becoming the norm as families adapt their shopping patterns to current economic conditions.”