Jerry Ulm Dodge buys Crazy Buffet restaurant

BUYER: Jerry Ulm Dodge Inc. (officers: Gerald, Carolyn and Vena Ulm), Tampa
SELLER: Business Properties Lending Inc. as attorney-in-fact for Wells Fargo Bank NA as trustee for the GE Business Loan Pass-Through Certificates 2006-1
PROPERTY: 2702 N. Dale Mabry Highway, Tampa
PRICE: $3.25 million
PREVIOUS PRICE: $2.75 million, August 2002
LAW FIRM ON DEED: Driver McAfee Peek & Hawthorne PL, Jacksonville

PLANS, DESCRIPTION:
Tampa auto dealership Jerry Ulm Dodge Chrysler Jeep purchased the nearby 11,937-square-foot former Crazy Buffet restaurant for $3.25 million.

The price equated to $272 per square foot. That figure is higher than the two-year average price per square foot for retail space ($138) in the Tampa Bay area, according to the CoStar Group.

The restaurant gives the dealership an additional 1.82 acres of land.

The seller, Business Properties Lending Inc., foreclosed on the property in January.

Ed Dickinson of Walter Dickinson of Tampa Bay Inc. handled the sale.

“What made the property so interesting is we did an opinion value on the property and it came back that in the Westshore District there was nothing like it,” he says. “You have nine [parking] spaces per 1,000 square feet and a 12,000-square-foot freestanding building, which puts it firmly in the medical office realm.”

Ultimately, it was the sales success of the Chrysler brand that convinced the dealership to buy the additional property, Dickinson says.