Phantom Fireworks buys Shoppes at the Forest

BUYER: Phantom of Fort Myers Inc. (principals: Bruce and Alan Zoldan, Jerry Bostocky, Kevin Henchar and William Weimer), Youngstown, Ohio
SELLER: SunTrust Bank
PROPERTY: 16243 S. Tamiami Trail, Fort Myers
PRICE: $1.19 million
PREVIOUS PRICE: $1.19 million, February 2006
TITLE FIRM ON DEED: Old Republic National Title Insurance Co., Tampa

PLANS, DESCRIPTION:
Youngstown, Ohio-based Phantom Fireworks purchased the 12,000-square-foot Shoppes at the Forest retail strip center for $1.19 million.

The price equated to $99 per square feet. That figure is less than the two-year average price per square foot for retail space ($144) in Southwest Florida, according to the CoStar Group.

Phantom Fireworks currently leases 8,400 square feet in the center. Built in 2008, the shopping center features two additional tenant spaces with a total of 3,600 square feet of space.

“We own lots of property where we do business,” says William Weimer, vice president of Phantom Fireworks. “This has been a good unit for us and we had no intention of leaving.”

The fireworks store moved to the building a little more than four years ago from a space on Tamiami Trail with the promise of a larger space and better parking lot. The seller, SunTrust Bank, foreclosed on the property from Shoppes at the Forest LLC in December 2012.

“Our plans are absent a killer season that we will market the remaining space for rent to somebody else,” Weimer says. “We feel good about the market and are exited about the prospective of being a land-owning citizen of the community.”

Phantom Fireworks has more than 1,200 firework stores nationwide.