One of the largest regional real estate deals of 2024 ended the year with a whimper, not a bang.
The Forum at Fort Myers, a 185,813-square-foot shopping center at the northeast quadrant of Interstate 75 and Colonial Boulevard, sold Nov. 26 for $41.37 million.
The private transaction didn’t become a public record until Dec. 23, and the buyer, seller and brokers either did not respond to interview requests or, in the case of the brokers, declined to comment because of nondisclosure agreements.
InevenTrust Properties Corp., based in Downers Grove, Illinois, bought The Forum. The space has addresses of 9360-9390 Dynasty Drive and 3230-3274 Forum Blvd.
The transaction did not include the Home Depot or Super Target spaces, which have separate ownership. But the deal includes most of the structures adjacent to those two stores.
Michaels, Sky Zone, Petco and Buffalo Wild Wings comprise the spaces just south of the Super Target that were part of the deal.
On the north side of the shopping center, Ross Dress For Less, DD’s Discounts and Staples comprise the most space. There are several dining options there as well, including Bahia Bowls, Five Guys, Subway and Poke Hawaii, among other stores.
The future most likely will be business as usual, said Justin Thibaut, CEO of LSI Companies, who was not involved in this deal. But last year Thibaut did broker the nearby, $66.5 million land deal off State Road 82, where Amazon plans to build a new distribution center over the next two years.
“Generally, those types of transactions, there is very little change in the day-to-day for a shopping center like that,” Thibaut said. “They might have some type of value-add motivation there, where they might improve the facades or something like that. But that’s one of the more highly trafficked shopping centers in Lee County. That’s probably just a core, long-term hold purchase. They’ve seen the growth around The Forum, and they’ve seen growth coming to State Road 82.”
In 1998, all of this land sat vacant as part of 700 acres sold by the city of Fort Myers for $12.5 million to a company called AGBLLC, which was owned in part by legendary basketball coach Pat Riley. The Forum shares its name with the arena at which Riley’s Los Angeles Lakers won four NBA championships in the 1980s.
This marks the fifth time the land has changed hands since then.
Farallon Capital Management, the most recent, previous owner, is based in San Francisco. Farallon bought the shopping center for $29 million in May 2022, at a time when retail centers still weren’t on the radar of most investors, Thibaut said.
“A couple years ago, in 2021, we weren’t seeing a whole lot of retail trades,” Thibaut said. “But now equity firms and investment firms are investing in retail plazas again.
“I think eyes are back on solid, long-term lease shopping centers. There was a sharp pullback during COVID-19. Who’s going to go to a store again? But we’ve seen that flipped on its head. There’s going to be a continued battle between brick and mortar and online shopping and delivery. Four years post-COVID-19, people are still going to brick-and-mortar establishments to shop.”
