The retail segments, called Market on the Waterfront and Waterfront Town Center, are part of The Waterfront, Homestead, Pa., a project Ohio-based Continental Real Estate Cos. is building on the Monongahela River. Inland Retail bought the combined 750,000 square feet of space from Continental at a cap rate of 8.5 percent.
Continental began building the Waterfront in 2001, and some 30,000 square feet of additional retail is set to open there next year. The project also contains 237 apartment units and 350,000 square feet of office and industrial space. Continental says it will keep those sections.
Barnes & Noble, Dick’s Sporting Goods and Victoria’s Secret are among Waterfront’s retailers. Giant Eagle Foods, Kaufmann’s, Lowe’s and Target are also part of the development, though they own their stores.
Continental did not build the Waterfront with the intention of selling, Jonathan Kass, Continental’s president of development, told SCT Newswire. But "we do sell when we get an offer that’s too good to refuse," he said. Continental also owns specialty centers in Cincinnati; Marlton, N.J.; Portland, Ore.; and other cities. The company broke ground last month on The North Shore mixed-use center in Pittsburgh. North Shore is scheduled to open in 2008 with 250,000 square feet of retail.
Inland Retail’s parent, the Oak Brook, Ill.–based Inland Group of Real Estate Cos., owns 495 retail properties, mainly on the East Coast and in the Midwest. The company has grown rapidly and is now the fifth-largest owner of retail real estate in the United States. Inland recently formed The Inland Western Real Estate Trust to buy properties principally in Western states. The trust bought its first center this week, the 116,300-square-foot Shops at Park Place, Plano, Texas, for $23.9 million.