Apartments, Retail Sell Amid Rent Spike in Denver Suburbs

A strip mall and an apartment building in Aurora traded hands in a $50.5 million transaction.

Two Arrows Group, Spark & Halo and OlivePoint Capital teamed up to buy the Parkside at City Center retail buildings and Stella on the Park apartments for, the Denver Business Journal reported. The seller was Parkside Aurora, an affiliate of Milender White Construction, which co-developed and built the community in 2021.

The sale included three retail buildings at 14505, 14515 and 14535 East Alameda Avenue spanning 25,000 square feet. The 216-unit apartment complex, at 14565 East Alameda Avenue, has 11,000 square feet of ground-floor retail. The properties sit across the street from the Town Center at Aurora mall and next to City Center Park.

The retail buildings were 86 percent leased at the time of the sale. Tenants include Five Guys, Einstein Bros. Bagels and Cheba Hut. More than 64,000 visitors stop by the property every day, according to JLL, which represented the seller.

The Denver suburb has seen “significant multifamily expansion” as well as “retail rent growth of nearly 25 percent” over the past five years, JLL’s Austin Snedden told the outlet. The retail market in the Denver metro area ended the second quarter with an availability rate of 4.8 percent, representing a slight quarter-over-quarter decrease, according to CBRE. The multifamily market finished the second quarter with a 94.5 percent occupancy rate.

Aurora is among the Denver suburbs that condo buyers have been fleeing to in search of more attainable housing, the Denver Post reported.

Multifamily construction could pick up in the coming months.

In May, Gov. Jared Polis signed House Bill 25-1272, creating a multifamily construction incentive program that reduces some legal liability for builders as long as they adhere to stricter construction and warranty standards and allow third-party inspections. The following month, the Aurora City Council approved the expansion of the Fitzsimons Innovation Community from a maximum of 850 units to over 7,000.

— Chris Malone Méndez