The developers negotiated a $5 million land deal Thursday with New York-based Morgan Stanley for the 30-year-old, 14.5 acre North Lake Plaza Shopping Center where the planned 24-acre Altamonte Springs Town Center will be built. The site is seven miles north of Downtown Orlando.

Morgan Stanley had asked $8.5 million or $425,000 per acre ($9.76 per sf) in November 2001. Another developer, Guy Scott of Altamonte Springs Development Corp., didn't go through with the deal at that time.

The Jacoby-Vlass-Martin team acquired the dirt for $344,828 per acre or $7.91 per sf. The developers will be buying another 9.5 acres from Altamonte Springs at possibly the same price, area brokers tell GlobeSt.com on condition of anonymity. If purchased at the same price, the 9.5-acre deal would come to $3.28 million, for a total land assemblage cost of $8.28 million. That transaction would make the dirt the largest retail deal of the year to date, area brokers tell GlobeSt.com.