SKB Picks Up Shopping Center, Adds Key Staff

PORTLAND, OR-ScanlanKemperBard Cos. has acquired the Lake Place Shopping Center here for $6.13 million. The 50,112-sf neighborhood retail shopping center is 94% leased to 20 tenants, including the Trainer’s Club fitness center, Petco, Mailboxes Etc., Destination Bride and Lake Oswego Jewelers. The 3.03-acre property is located at 333 South State St. in Downtown Lake Oswego. The development consists of three Stucco-covered masonry and wood buildings constructed in 1987. “The property benefits greatly from the lack of developable land within the submarket,” says SKB principal Bob Scanlan. “This is an irreplaceable infill location in the heart of the region’s most affluent communities.”Scanlan tells GlobeSt.com that the in-place rents at Lake Place are 10% to 15% below current market rents and, even at market, would be below the asking lease rate of other nearby centers. As a result, Lake Place should generate increased rental revenue as tenants’ leases come due and are renewed or leased to another retailer. In addition, Scanlan says Petco may expand its presence in the center, eating up much of the available space. SKB has hired Cushman & Wakefield to manage Lake Place Shopping Center. C&W also manages the Uptown Shopping Center in Portland for SKB. “Given SKB’s national contract with C&W, we have negotiated very favorable terms for the property management,” Scanlan says.SKB invests in real estate on behalf of more than 650 high-net-worth individuals, families and trusts, about 450 of which invested with SKB in 2004. SKB had its biggest year to date in 2004, acquiring $259 million of real estate, and this year projects it will acquire properties totaling $300 million or more.As part of that effort, SKB has added two managing directors and a senior vice president in recent months. The managing directors, Robert Greening and Vince Fong, will focus on business development and investor relations. Fred Baugh, the new senior vice president of asset management, will oversee management and leasing of newly acquired properties and assist with due diligence, acquisitions and dispositions. “Our investor base continues to expand, and we need specialists who can support and enhance that growth,” Scanlan says. Prior to joining SKB, Greening worked as a legal counsel and consultant to various organizations, including the Oregon Economic and Community Development Department. Before that, he led several locally based companies, including Kombucha Wonder Drink LLC, G.H. Goldstick & Co. and Robert Greening Consulting, as well as Oregon Wood Products Inc. of Columbia City and Omnichrome Corp. of Chino, CA. He first became familiar with SKB as a client. “After investing in 11 different deals, both development and income-producing, and becoming more acquainted with SKB personnel, I was impressed. …,” Greening says. “Moreover, in just two years since investing in my first project, SKB is already delivering results in excess of original projections on several deals. [Fellow managing director] Bob Gibson and I decided to team up to bring the benefits of SKB investments to more investors like me.”Fong was the Vice President of Taxation for Levi Strauss & Co. from 1988 to 2004. He previously worked as a senior tax executive for multinationals such as Varian Associates, Atari Corp. and ComputerLand Corp. Formerly a resident of the Bay Area, he now resides in Las Vegas.”I have invested with SKB for several years and have been very impressed with the organization and the quality of the product; because of that I have referred a number of friends and family,” Fong says. “After a number of these referrals, Bob Scanlan and I decided to formalize the relationship.”Much of the expected 16% growth in acquisitions in 2005 is related to investor interest in SKB’s new $50-million private equity fund. Under the current set up, once SKB finds the right deal, it ties up the property then goes out to its client base to collect the necessary equity for the transaction. Under the new set up, the fund will provide up to half of the equity for every deal in which SKB decides to invest. In addition to attracting new clients, Scanlan says the fund is being well received by existing investors, many of whom have wanted to invest in every SKB deal but have been unable to do so because the equity requirement is filled before they elect to participate. In Portland, SKB is investing in the development of the South Waterfront by backing the high-rise residential projects of locally based Williams & Dame and Gerding/Edlen Development, including the John Ross, which is breaking ground this month. SKB also is working with Williams & Dame in Southern California, where in partnership with Gerding/Edlen is developing Elleven, the first new ground-up condominium development built in Downtown Los Angeles since the 1980s. The first 179 units of the 750-unit project are under construction.