Oak Park sales price doubles in three years as new owners buy Hixson center for $22.75 million

photo The Oak Park Town Center, located in Hixson, has been sold.

One of Hixson's biggest shopping centers has sold for more than twice the price it was bought for just three years ago.

Oak Park Town Center, which holds Walmart and recently added Gander Mountain and Burkes on Highway 153, was brought by Ohio-based real estate company Devonshire for $22.75 million.

Three years ago, seller Oak Park Partners LLC of Rome, Ga., bought the center at a foreclosure action for $9 million.

Eric Hutchins of Devonshire, a real estate investment trust headquartered outside of Toledo, said the company wanted to move into the Tennessee market, and investors liked the shopping center and the Chattanooga area. He said Oak Park has strong anchor retail tenants and few vacancies.

"That fits our portfolio," Hutchins said. Oak Park, built in 2001 by Wolford Development, has about 178,000 square feet of space, not including the Walmart.

In Tennessee, Devonshire also owns a Knoxville shopping center, Northwest Crossings, on Clinton Highway. But most of its holdings are located in Ohio and Michigan.

David DeVaney, president of NAI Charter Real Estate Corp., which is not connected with the Oak Park property, said the Hixson market is strong and the Oak Park deal shows an improvement of real estate as an investment.

DeVaney said that when real estate started having troubles during the Great Recession, banks were selling loans and wanted out of the sector.

"People who had cash found some pretty good deals," he said.

The center was last sold in December 2011. Just a few months earlier that year, nearby Northgate Mall on Highway 153 was bought by Chattanooga-based CBL & Associates Properties Inc. from General Growth Properties for $11.5 million. The mall had at that time been appraised at $30.1 million.

Also off Highway 153, a developer is proposing a $100 million commercial and retail project on a 190-acre tract near Boy Scout Road.

Called Hillocks Farm, Chattanooga developer Duane Horton said earlier this month he has a letter of intent from a company aiming to build new apartments at the site. Horton told more than a dozen citizens during an update meeting that work could start in early summer on the apartment piece of the project. Plans call for 280 apartments.

Horton also said he has "three really good leads" for anchor retailers.

"I think we'll have the three anchors we're going to need," he said, adding it could be 2016 before works starts on the retail component. Plans call for 500,000 square feet of retail stores.

Contact Mike Pare at mpare@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6318.

Upcoming Events