Shopping center investor DJM’s local buys near $200M

Adds MV’s Gateway Center After LBX Buy

DJM Capital Partners continues to be bullish on local retail properties, and has been involved in nearly $200 million of local acquisitions over the past month or so.

More buys are on tap, company officials say.

An affiliate of the San Jose-based shopping center owner, investor and property manager recently closed on the purchase of Gateway Center, a nine-building retail center along Alicia Parkway in Mission Viejo, the Business Journal has learned.

Property records indicate DJM paid about $39.5 million for the nearly 79,000-squarefoot property, or roughly $500 per square foot.

It was sold by an affiliate of San Diegobased Gerrity Group LLC, a privately held retail property investor. Gerrity paid a reported $28.6 million for the center in 2013.

Gateway Center is about a mile from the San Diego (5) Freeway at Alicia Parkway and Jeronimo Road. It was built in 1978 and sits on 8.6 acres. It counts a collection of smallersized tenants.

LBX Record-Breaker

The deal follows DJM’s involvement in the purchase of the Long Beach Exchange, the 26-acre shopping center that opened a few years ago next to the Long Beach Airport.

The Business Journal earlier this month was first to report on the sale of the LBX by Newport Beach’s Burnham Ward Properties, in a deal that approached $160 million, according to sources.

By total price, that deal is tops among regional retail center sales reported since the onset of the pandemic.

At nearly $600 per square foot, it’s also a record-setter in terms of price per square foot for large local retail properties in recent years.

DJM took over the Long Beach center in a venture with institutional investor PGIM.

More to Come

Subsequent to the Business Journal’s story on the LBX buy, DJM said in a statement that it “is placing a heavy emphasis on growth and portfolio expansion of open-air retail coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic.”

“Over the next year, we plan to double the square footage of our assets under management and focus on aggressive growth within our company,” DJM President Lindsay Parton said in a statement. ■