Will Cary’s South Hills Mall become a giant sports complex? It has new owners.
South Hills Mall & Plaza, a 60-year-old shopping center on Buck Jones Road at the border of Raleigh and Cary, has new owners with ambitious redevelopment plans.
Raleigh-based developer Loden Properties and Northpond Partners, a Chicago real estate investment company, teamed up last week to buy the property for $38.4 million, according to Northpond.
“Cary’s oldest mall,” as South Hills has long identified, is overdue for a substantial face lift, its new owners say.
“This isn’t the kind of property we bought to keep as is,” Sam Ankin, Northpond’s managing principal, told The News & Observer. “We have big plans for that whole property.”
The site is at about 94% occupancy, with 31 retailers, restaurants and other businesses listed in the plaza’s directory. Ankin could not confirm whether any of the mall’s tenants, including the popular Grand Asia Market, would survive redevelopment plans.
“Everything’s on the table,” he said. “We’ll meet with the tenants to find out what their long term goals are and see if they’re the right fit in terms of whatever the new development or redevelopment becomes.”
The site is almost sure to introduce new offerings. One possibility is the $193 million, town-sponsored sports complex that had been slated for construction on the Cary Towne Center grounds before Epic Games bought the site in January.
“We’re looking forward to working with the city on the entire project and if that includes any portion of that (sports complex) we’re open to that idea,” Ankin said. “But there’s no concrete plan yet.”
Cary officials and staff discussed the possibility of renewing their bid for a sports complex at the town’s retreat Friday, according to Mayor Harold Weinbrecht, who recapped the group’s talking points on his website.
South Hills “will likely be a mixed use and could house the multiplex sports venue,” Weinbrecht wrote. Wednesday, he confirmed to The N&O the possibility of the sports complex but did not know additional details.
Ankin confirmed his team is likely to pursue a mixed-use development featuring a combination of new retail, dining, office and residential spaces.
“What we really want to do is to lead with retail, food and beverage, entertainment — an experiential nature,” he said. “And if we accomplish that, then we also create a place where people might want to live and work.”
The shopping plaza’s 370,000 square feet of current retail space sits on about 23 acres, Ankin said, but the entire property includes almost 50 acres. Northpond hopes to approach the town with redevelopment proposals within the first half of 2022.
“There are very few opportunities within the Triangle, let alone within the country, to have as well located a property as this,” Ankin said. “The opportunities are endless and we’re excited to get started.”
This story was originally published November 24, 2021 at 11:49 AM.
