Loja Real Estate LLC buys Tampa Trader Joe's

BUYER: LOJA FL Retail LLC (principal: Tom Engberg), Walnut Creek, Calif.
SELLER: CAP Dale Mabry LLC
PROPERTY: 3808 W. Swann Ave., Tampa
PRICE: $8.18 million
PREVIOUS PRICE: $2.7 million, August 2013

PLANS, DESCRIPTION:
Loja Real Estate LLC, a subsidiary of the California real estate investment management firm Loja Group LLC, purchased a 12,318-square-foot building housing Trader Joe's for $8.18 million.

The price equated to $664 per square foot. That figure is higher than the two-year average price per square foot for retail space ($146) in the Tampa Bay area, according to the CoStar Group.

The seller an affiliate of Greenville, S.C.-based Centennial American Properties purchased the former Shapes fitness center on 0.99 acres of land in August and renovated it for the prominent specialty grocer. Trader Joe's opened the store, its first in Tampa Bay area, on March 21.

Loja Real Estate LLC acquired the Tampa store nearly a month after it bought a Trader Joe's building in the Chicago suburb of Libertyville, Ill. That 12,529-square-foot store opened in late February.

“We couldn't be more pleased to add these newly developed Trader Joe's into our ever-growing single-tenant grocer portfolio,” Scott Kyman, vice president of acquisitions for Loja Real Estate, says in a press release. “Trader Joe's Libertyville serves an affluent greater Chicago community at a well-positioned location while Trader Joe's Tampa exemplifies Trader Joe's growing footprint in Florida in dense infill trade areas. Both store openings were extremely well received in their local communities.”

These acquisitions represent the sixth and seventh Trader Joe's properties in Loja Real Estate's portfolio.

Loja Group LLC has $200 million in assets under management and its commercial real estate subsidiary has more than $100 million worth of additional properties under contract or in its active pipeline.