Lightstone Pays $52.7M for 2.3-MSF Acadia Retail Portfolio

NEW YORK CITY-Long Island-based mall REIT Acadia Realty Trust has completed the previously announced sale of the so-called Morgan Stanley properties, 17 retail centers located throughout Pennsylvania and the Southeast. Lakewood, NJ-based private real estate firm the Lightstone Group paid $52.7 million for the 2.3-million-sf portfolio.

The deal marks the end of Acadia’s three-year selling spree of non-strategic assets, allowing the Port Washington-based REIT to concentrate on its core portfolio of 32 retail properties, 30 of which are located in the Northeast and two in the Midwest. Acadia will also sharpen it focus on the $90-million joint venture it formed last October with four of its key institutional investors. The REIT put $20 million into the JV, which is expected to spend up to $300 million on shopping center properties.

“The disposition program was one of the major legs of our disposition program,” Acadia vice president Jon Grisham tells GlobeSt.com. “The sale of the Morgan Stanley properties (Morgan Stanley was the original underwriter on the portfolio prior to its securitization) concludes that planned disposition. We’re now well positioned for growth going forward, both from embedded growth from within our core portfolio and from external growth from our new joint venture. Also, as a result of our disposition program, we are left with a very healthy balance sheet with strong access to capital.”