Bain, 11North Spend $300M on Open-Air Retail Portfolio

Bain Capital Real Estate and 11North Partners are putting their billions in raised capital to use across the country.

A joint venture between the two companies paid roughly $300 million for five open-air retail centers, the firms announced on Wednesday. The retail centers span markets, including properties in Carlsbad, California; Falls Church, Virginia; Altamonte Springs, Florida; and Sugar Land, Texas.

The portfolio of five retail centers spans a combined 757,000 square feet, breaking down the acquisition costs to roughly $396 per square foot. Major tenants complete the portfolio, including Harris Teeter, Trader Joe’s, Walmart, Costco, and Equinox; occupancy across the portfolio is 93 percent.

“Open-air, grocery-anchored retail continues to demonstrate some of the most compelling risk-adjusted fundamentals in the real estate landscape,” 11North founder Brian Harper said in a statement.

The partners launched their joint venture a little more than two years ago. They’ve since deployed almost $1 billion in capital, building a 2-million-square-foot portfolio across six separate transactions. Among the deals were acquiring a 10-asset portfolio of Publix-anchored retail centers in Florida and South Carolina for $395 million and a three-asset retail center acquisition in Oklahoma City for $212 million.

At the end of last year, the joint venture closed a $1.6 billion fundraise, pushing collective equity to invest in the open-air retail operating platform past $2 billion.

The fund, anchored by two unnamed global institutional investors, is focused on acquiring “generational grocery-anchored real estate” assets.

Bain Capital, founded in 1984, has roughly $225 billion of assets under management. Harper founded 11North in 2024 after Kimco Realty’s acquisition of RPT Realty, where he was chief executive officer. 11North staff members are formerly of RPT; Bain Capital has an ownership stake in 11North.

Investors have gravitated to open-air retail centers and grocery-anchored assets as strong performers in the retail sector.

Slate Grocery REIT recently formed a special committee to evaluate strategic alternatives following an unsolicited takeover bid from private affiliates of its external manager, Slate Asset Management.

The firm’s $2.4 billion portfolio consists of 15.2 million square feet across 23 U.S. states; nearly half of its properties are in the Southeast, and almost a fifth of its portfolio is occupied by Kroger and Walmart.