The two firms entered into joint ventures in 2002 and 2003, which included the option that either would be entitled to certain preferred returns on contributed equity. Cedar paid to Kimco $17.5 million for the four properties, funding the transaction from its revolving credit facility.

Valued at approximately $52.9 million, their current debt is approximately $27.3 million. The acquisition is expected to be accretive to the company's FFO on an annual basis in the amount of approximately $0.015 per share/OP Unit--approximately $0.005 to its net income per share.

According to Leo Ullman, Cedar's CEO, one of the advantages of the deal's structure is that it eliminates the continuance of a preferred return structure, in effect replacing it with much cheaper debt, "while permitting our company to benefit from future growth of these fine supermarket-anchored properties, which continue to evidence strong results." Ullman also notes that the 484,500-sf portfolio dovetails with the company's development strategy as two of the properties are already included in its revealed pipeline allowing the company to improve its return on investment as full owners of the assets.