Neighborhood center changes hands near Eastmark MPC in Arizona

A Southern California investor paid $12.5 million for an 83,743-sq.-ft. Basha’s-anchored neighborhood center in Mesa, Ariz., near the Eastmark master-planned community. Velocity Retail Group and Faris Lee Investments handled the deal on behalf of the seller, Augusta Ranch LLC.

The Augusta Ranch Marketplace benefits from a growing population at Eastmark, a 3,200-acre development jointly owned and developed by DMB Associates and Brookfield Residential. PCS Development will break ground on a new $80 million luxury residential community there this year.

“The key to our marketing strategy was to focus on the strength of one of the largest master-planned communities in the U.S. with significant residential and industrial growth for years to come,” said Don MacLellan, senior managing partner of Faris Lee.

The sale represented one of the few grocery-anchored transactions in the metropolitan Phoenix market during 2020 and was the only Bashas’ anchored center sold during that time. The pandemic has limited investment sales for multi-tenant retail properties, but the growing Eastmark development.