Nohl Plaza, a 103,639-square-foot grocery-anchored shopping center in Orange, traded hands this month for $25.3 million.
Jacksonville, Fla.-based Regency Centers Corp. (Nasdaq: REG) purchased the 80-year ground lease for the shopping center from Nohl Plaza LLC, which property records indicate is an affiliate of Newport Beach-based real estate investment trust CV Holdings Inc. (OTC: CVHL).
The property, located on the corner of North Tustin Street and Lincoln Avenue just west of the Costa Mesa (55) Freeway, is 95% leased to tenants including Vons, Starbucks, Del Taco, Bank of America, Tartan Room steakhouse and a Union 76 gas station.
Nohl Plaza, developed between 1966 and 1979, gets about 1.3 million visits a year, marketing materials note.
Regency Centers is now planning a facelift of the shopping center and aims to bring in new tenants to up foot traffic.
“California has been a good market for us, especially Orange County,” Regency Senior VP of Investments John Mehigan told the Business Journal. “Customers in OC really respond to the types of centers we own, which are surface park, grocery-anchored centers.”
Institutional Property Advisors (IPA), a division of commercial property company Marcus & Millichap (NYSE: MMI) brokered the deal.
Generational Asset
Nohl Plaza LLC bought the shopping center in 1989 for an undisclosed price.
As longtime owners of Nohl Plaza, “the sale of this generational asset was emotional for the sellers, but they are thrilled with the exceptional price and Regency Centers,” IPA Executive Director Tom Lagos said in a statement.
OC Portfolio
Regency’s purchase of Nohl Plaza brings its total number of OC properties to 12.
The company’s local footprint encompasses 1.5 million square feet of grocery-anchored centers.
Nohl Plaza is also the company’s first OC investment since the pandemic.
Regency’s last purchase in the area closed seven years ago, when the company bought the land for The Village at Tustin Legacy. Regency invested about $40 million into the project, with tenants including Hoag Hospital, Stater Brothers, CVS Pharmacy and Encompass Health.
Other OC centers owned by Regency include Heritage Plaza in Irvine, anchored by Ralphs; and the Village at La Floresta with Whole Foods and Rona Plaza in Santa Ana, anchored by Superior Grocers.
Neighborhood Retail Boom
Regency’s bid for Nohl Plaza was selected out of more than a dozen offers, according to IPA officials.
Retail centers like Nohl Plaza have been getting more attention from investors and developers as they’ve withstood online shopping trends.
“For a while, all you could hear about was retail armageddon,” Mehigan said. “Though I feel like that was really more about the mall world rather than the neighborhood side of retail.”
