CREC, Lubert Adler sell Coral Springs shopping center for $48M to Zurich Insurance asset manager

A joint venture between CREC and Lubert Adler Real Estate Funds just sold a shopping center in Coral Springs for $48 million, nearly double what the venture paid in 2015.

Property records show CPAC Royal University sold the Royal University Plaza at 2556 North University Drive to New York-based Zurich Alternative Asset Management, a subsidiary of Zurich Insurance Group.

The CREC-Lubert Adler joint venture bought the 10-acre property in February 2015 for $26 million with plans to renovate and lease the then 100,000-square-foot shopping center. It was 45 percent leased when it last sold, and is now 98 percent leased.

CREC and Lubert Adler also expanded Royal University Plaza for Orchard Supply, which has about 37,000 square feet, and brought in Total Wine & More to lease about 25,000 square feet.

The 115,000-square-foot center just sold for more than $415 per square foot. Other tenants include Pet Supermarket, Jimmy John’s and Brooklyn Water Bagel Co.

Asking rents are in the low $30s per square foot. “We pushed rents, but we really did was push occupancy and now we have a waiting list of tenants,” Warren Weiser, CREC chairman and partner, said. Weiser, CREC partner Alan Esquenazi and vice president Andrew Remick said the commercial real estate firm is looking to acquire more value-add properties like Royal University Plaza.

While the deal was off-market, Weiser said the firms were eventually planning on selling the shopping center.

Esquenazi and Sabrina Meerbott, director of retail leasing, handled leasing. Renovations included painting, landscaping, new lighting, adding an access turn lane and other facelift-type upgrades.

The $48 million sale is the second largest for a shopping center in Broward County so far this year, a spokesperson for CREC said. In February, InvenTrust Properties Corp. paid about $163 million for two shopping centers in Pembroke Pines, Paraiso Parc and Westfork Plaza, both on Pines Boulevard.

The asset manager arm of Zurich Insurance Group targets commercial real estate markets like Boston, New York, Los Angeles and Miami, according to its website. The asset manager’s real estate portfolio includes more than 20 million square feet of space in more than 200 properties.