Clearwater McDonald’s property sells for $3 million

A Clearwater property with a McDonald’s on it has sold as part of a 1031 Exchange for the equivalent of a lot Big Macs.

The property is at 2871 Gulf-to-Bay Blvd. and, according to Pinellas County property records, the buyer was a Syracuse, New York, company tied to commercial real estate developer and management firm The Widewaters Group.

It paid $3.07 in a ground lease sale.

SRS Real Estate Partners’ capital markets division, which represented the seller and announced the deal, says the closing cap rate was 3.87%. That's the lowest cap rate for a McDonald’s property sold on a national basis this year, per CoStar records.

The property itself sits on 1.28 acres and is just east of U.S. Highway 19. It is part of a commercial strip as you enter the city from Tampa on the Courtney Campbell Causeway.

Among its neighbors are the famed Robert’s Christmas Wonderland Store, the original Hooters restaurant and one of the city’s largest shopping centers on the site of the former Clearwater Mall.

The McDonald’s is 5,447 square feet and was built in 2014. According to an SRS spokesperson there are about 10 years left on the existing lease with options to extend.

SRS capital markets thus far this year has completed 182 deals in 34 states totaling $731 million in deal volume, according to a statement. The Dallas-based company, which has an office in Tampa, has more than 698 properties on the market with a market value of more than $3.7 billion.

Sean Lutz and Dan Elliot, vice presidents in SRS's Chicago office, brokered the deal.

Widewaters, meanwhile, has done work in the region before. More than a decade ago the company redeveloped the Manatee River Hotel in downtown Bradenton into a 115-room Hampton Inn & Suites. The $17 million project of the 86-year-old building — known as the Pink Palace for its color — was the catalyst for several other downtown Bradenton redevelopment projects that followed it.