Charlotte’s Queen City Quarter Heads Back to Market

Charlotte’s once-buzzy Epicentre — now rebranded as Queen City Quarter — is headed back to the sales block as vacancies mount and foot traffic remains elusive years after the pandemic.

CBRE plans to list the 302,000-square-foot uptown entertainment complex at 201 East Trade Street within weeks, according to Patrick Gildea, the brokerage’s vice chairman, the Charlotte Observer reported. The listing marks the latest attempt to reposition the troubled property, which Deutsche Bank took over at a foreclosure auction in 2022.

The Charlotte Business Journal first reported the upcoming sale.

Queen City Quarter’s occupancy has thinned dramatically. The property’s website lists just 14 of its 50 tenant spaces filled, though two of those businesses — CVS and Tailored Smoke Cigar Lounge — have also closed, leaving only about a dozen active tenants, according to the Charlotte Observer. That puts the complex’s vacancy rate at roughly 76 percent.

Gildea told the outlet that any buyer will likely need a strategy to revive the property rather than simply operate it as-is — a shift he suggested could ultimately benefit the surrounding uptown district.

The complex last sold in 2022, when Deutsche Bank acquired it for $95 million as the lone bidder at a foreclosure auction after the previous owner defaulted on an $85 million loan. The lender soon brought in CBRE to help reposition the property, according to the publication.

A year later, the three-story venue was rebranded as Queen City Quarter, an attempt to move away from its reputation as a nightlife-heavy party hub and reposition it as a broader entertainment and dining destination aimed at office workers, families and tourists, but tenants told the outlet that declining foot traffic continues to weigh on sales.

Samantha Francis, general manager of Mortimer’s Cafe & Pub — the last sports bar still operating from the Epicentre era — said the complex needs a stronger events pipeline to bring people back.

“A new owner, if anything, would bring a source of hope,” Francis said, adding that the complex needs “reinvention” rather than another rebrand.

Next door, the retro-themed RedEye Diner has also seen sales fall. Owner Brian Dominick said the challenge extends beyond the property itself.

When Epicentre opened in 2008, the one-block complex quickly became Charlotte’s nightlife epicenter, hosting major events tied to the CIAA basketball tournament, the NBA All-Star Game and the Democratic National Convention.

California-based CIM Group bought the property in 2014 for $130.5 million when it was 94 percent leased. But rising crime concerns and the pandemic hollowed out the tenant roster.

— Eric Weilbacher