Mall Sale

DDR has sold the Family Centers in Taylorsville, Midvale, and Orem to Excel Trust, a San Diego REIT.  Excel then flipped the Taylorsville center to Texas-based TriGate Capital.  Excel's purchase price was $225.6 million.

When I first started practicing law, my office was right across the street from the Midvale center.  My building was the only office tower there then, and the Family Center was little more than a strip mall.  Things have changed considerably since then.  Not always for the better.  A few years ago, it looked like the place was going the way of so many other small malls, with anchors leaving and small spaces going and staying dark.  DDR managed to turn things around, though, replacing anchors and bringing in new shops, including local merchants, a move that would give outfits like Taubman a seizure.  Still a lot of question marks, though, such as the future of the Office Max space now that the merger with Office Depot has gone through.  Time will tell.

What Passes for Business Reporting in Utah

If you want business news in Utah, don't look for anything that matters from any of the local, mainstream media. The bulk of the "business reporting" here is nothing more than company press releases with no editing or additions. An article on the City Creek Center in this morning's Trib is a prime example. Taubman Centers, Inc., is developing and managing City Creek, and it has issued a press release about bringing Linda Wardell to town as general manager. The article is nothing but PR gush, waxing rhapsodic about the big plans for City Creek and touting Wardell's experience as general manager of The Pier Shops at Caesar's in Atlantic City. And the Trib swallowed it and published it whole.

The Trib could not have done any research for this article. A basic Google search would have shown that, when Taubman launched The Pier in 2006 (a major overhaul of an existing mall on the site of the old Million Dollar Pier), it planned to install up-scale shops and restaurants anchored to a big, tourist draw (Caesar's at Atlantic City). In other words, the same plan it intends to use here (Granted, Caesar's and Temple Square are different draws, but they are still big, single-anchor draws.). A little research also would have shown that last year Taubman and Wardell failed at The Pier; Taubman strategically defaulted on a $135 million note and turned the keys over to Bank of America (See here and here.).

That's a real nice record of success coming to town. And the Trib missed every bit of it. Way to keep your readers informed, guys.