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Publix Super Markets Inc. has made a real estate acquisition in a fast-growing area within Osceola County, with one of its own stores serving as the property's featured tenant.
Real Sub LLC, an entity related to the Lakeland-based grocery giant, bought the 121,445-square-foot, Publix-anchored Osceola Village for $36.05 million on Aug. 5.
The seller was ECA Buligo Osceola Partners LP, an entity related to Tampa-based East Coast Acquisitions LLC, according to a deed posted to Osceola County public record.
The selling entity was represented in the transaction by the JLL Retail Capital Markets Investment Sales and Advisory team, led by senior managing director Brad Peterson and senior director Whitaker Leonhardt.
East Coast Acquisitions held the property for fewer than two years, having purchased it for $26.2 million in November of 2020 — meaning its sale price appreciated 37.6% in 22 months.
Originally built in 2008, the property was renovated earlier this year and was 100% leased at the time of the transaction.
Beside the Publix store there, tenants include Goodwill, Metro Diner, Insight Credit Union, Orlando Health and DaVita.
The property is near Osceola Parkway's intersection with John Young Parkway, just south of the Osceola-Orange county line and near the Hunters Creek area.
"The Osceola Parkway corridor, already established as a dominant retail node in Central Florida, is also experiencing an explosion of residential growth," Leonhardt said.
Local grocery expert Mark Thompson, founder of Orlando-based STNL.com, told Orlando Business Journal that the area around Osceola Village has changed tremendously during the past decade, making it an attractive asset for any buyer.
In addition to its proximity to some of Osceola County's major retail hubs, including The Loop in Kissimmee, he noted that within about one mile of the shopping center are 23 apartment complexes with 5,500 units, in addition to 11 schools with 8,600 students.
"That piece of real estate, over the last 10 years, has been greatly enhanced by the surrounding market area — it's hard to understate that," Thompson said. "The timing was right."
Publix has been an aggressive player in the real estate space, with previous reporting by the Tampa Bay Business Journal showing that between 2008 and 2016 it more than tripled the total value of its real estate to $5.5 billion.
Thompson said the grocery powerhouse is a "formidable buyer" whenever it identifies a property it wants.
"They're all-cash [buyers] and they don't have any questions about the anchor tenant," Thompson said.
Officials for Publix Super Markets Inc. were unavailable for comment.
The shopping center falls within the Tourist Corridor retail submarket, which has an average asking rent of $32.59 per square foot according to CoStar Group data, in addition to a 3.3% average vacancy rate. The metrics compare favorably to the Orlando metro as a whole, which has an average asking rent of $25.53 per square foot and average vacancy of 3.6%.
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Total dollar volume of sales/lease transactions
| Rank | Prior Rank | Company |
|---|---|---|
1 | 1 | Cushman & Wakefield Florida Inc. |
2 | 2 | Newmark |
3 | 3 | Lee & Associates Central Florida LLC |