Easton Group bought a JCPenney store at Miami International Mall, and the struggling retailer will stay on as the tenant.
Ed Easton, chairman of his Doral-based eponymous firm, told The Real Deal that he has no immediate plans to redevelop the 10.3-acre site at 1603 Northwest 107th Avenue in his home city. Other developers like Electra America and Codina Partners are involved in projects across South Florida that reimagine former big box buildings attached to indoor malls into mixed-use projects with apartments.
An Easton Group affiliate paid $12.2 million for the 150,108-square-foot single tenant building and adjoining parking lot within Miami International Mall’s site, records show. The seller, a trust formed in 2020 during JCPenney’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy case to sell off 146 stores, acquired the big box property in 2021.
JCPenney — which has continued closing stores across the country after emerging from bankruptcy reorganization in 2020 — doesn’t intend to shut down the Miami International Mall store and will serve out its lease, which expires in 2040, Easton said.
“JCPenney is current, and we anticipate they are going to be able to continue paying rent,” Easton said. “But we have a fall back position if they don’t. We would redevelop it.”
JCPenney is owned by a joint venture between Brookfield and Simon Property Group. Simon is also the owner of Miami International Mall’s 300,000-square-foot central component, which is experiencing retailer woes. The mall has four other big box buildings, including a shuttered Sears store.
An August Morningstar report found that the mall’s market value tanked to $159 million from $391 million a decade ago. The 59 percent drop in value could negatively impact Simon’s ability to refinance a $157.4 million commercial mortgage-backed securities loan that previously matured in February. At the time, the lender granted Simon a one-year forbearance.
A tenant exodus dropped the indoor shopping center’s occupancy to 78 percent as of March, Morningstar found.