FORT WORTH-After losing Burlington Coat Factory as an anchor tenant and going into foreclosure, Hulen Fashion Center's occupancy dropped to 43% last summer. But leasing activity at the 182,069-square-foot shopping center has increased over the last six months, according to Scott Rose, senior vice president with The Retail Connection, which handles leasing for the 1980s-era property.

Rose tells GlobeSt. that Hulen Fashion Center was taken off the market while The Retail Connection and the property's special servicer worked to bring a national retailer to the center. For more than a year, the team negotiated with the prospective tenant for more than 70,000 square feet, which would have involved demolishing a portion of the center. That deal fell through because a number of existing tenants could not be relocated.

Since then, the team has focused on backfilling the dark Burlington Coat Factory space (roughly 48,000 square feet), along with some other vacant small shop space. Rose, with the help of Terry Syler, also with The Retail Connection, recently signed two leases totaling 24,500 square feet and has letters of intent for another five leases totaling 25,000 waiting for signatures. If all seven leases are signed, the center's occupancy will reach nearly 90%, Rose tells GlobeSt.