A shopping center in North Naples, built in 2006, will get a fresh coat of paint and some upgrades from its new owner.
VW Equity, which invests across the Southeast, paid $6.7 million for almost 27,000 square feet of space.
Bougainvillea Center, 7740-7750 Preserve Lane, has a mix of tenants, including physical therapy franchise Fyzical, Pinch A Penny pool supply store, Zookie’s Sports Pub & Grill, a barbershop and more.
Incoming tenants include a dentist office and Zoom Room, a dog obedience school planning to open in mid-July.
“[COVID-19], as well as the Amazon effect have taken out weaker product-focused retailers, and service-focused retailers have survived,” said John Wakefield, co-principal of VW Equity. “Today, you really do have a service-retail presence in neighborhood centers like this one. We’ve got a great barbershop there and a dance studio, for example. Both are important neighborhoods service retailers.”
The landscaping and awnings will be updated over the next three to six months, Wakefield said, but the bigger changes will be seen down the road.
“In the end, I think you’re going to see a more upscale shopping center,” Wakefield said. “At the end of the day, a neighborhood retail center has to have a good mix of tenants to service the community. We’re really taking into consideration the community that is there. Who are the tenants that can serve that community? You’ve got Gulf Coast High School right across the street. It’s not out of the question to have an academic tutoring service retailer in there. We’re focused on the people who live there in that community and want retail. We want to make their lives better.”
Jim Shiebler, a broker with Marcus & Millichap, closed the deal after receiving 16 offers.
“It’s highly coveted for a number of reasons,” Shiebler said. “One, the wealth (in Naples), which is unprecedented. Two, the level of demand. Three, rent appreciation. And fourth, the migration levels, which are also off the charts, which are exponentially increasing and multiplied by the pandemic and also exacerbated by Hurricane Ian.”
There were only four shopping centers of similar size sold in Collier County last year, Shiebler said.
The location also made this shopping center stand out, as more than 40,000 vehicles per day drive by along Immokalee Road.
“This is only one of three east-west arteries in Collier County,” Shiebler said. “This artery or thoroughfare will really have over 70,000 cars [per day] that’s forecast over the next five or six years.”
It’s turning into the center of the county, and it’s insulated from any “doom and gloom” economic news faced by the rest of the country, Shiebler said.
“We’re in a little, fortified bubble,” he said. “It’s definitely opportunistic for sellers and buyers. Buyers can be much more aggressive on what they are purchasing because of that massive and longest growth runway from very historical low vacancies, as well as massive rent appreciation, coupled with that migration that comes into the market. It’s really the perfect storm of stability, so buyers can pay more for a property, knowing they are going to grow into that new income stream.”
