There hasn't been a major liquidation announcement by a company like Borders for a while, but that doesn't mean that there still isn't ongoing space to fill out there, says Mark Dufton, chief executive officer of DJM Realty, a Gordon Brothers Group company. His firm, which helps fill spaces left by closures will be exhibiting next week at the ICSC New York National Conference in the Hilton Hotel's Americas Hall 1 Booth #362. He recently spoke with GlobeSt.com about the store-closing situation, those who are filling vacancies and other trends.

GlobeSt.com: It seems like there are less mass store closures taking place. Is that evident on your end of the business?

Mark Dufton: A lot of the closures are just by natural expiration at this point, mainly because the retailers don’t want to take a charge or a write off to close a big group of stores that aren’t expiring where they have a remaining balance on the lease obligation. I’m not so sure that we’ve seen a slowdown in the number of closures, but it’s just a different type of closure. You’re still getting a healthy supply of excess space coming into the marketplace. It’s just not being backfilled that quickly, and if it is being backfilled, it’s being backfilled at lower rents. It’s so market specific right now. The real good real estate, in “A”-quality markets and locations, the rent has held up really well. There is plenty of demand for that space. But there seems to be an increasing gap between the “A” stuff and the “B” and “C” locations. That’s where you really see a tail off in the rents and an increase in the vacancy. That’s the dynamic that is taking place right now. In general, retailers are extremely cautious about opening new stores. They’re just not willing to put their capital at risk. Even when they do settle on a new store, it has to go through two or three real estate committees as opposed to real estate guys teeing it up, rubber stamping it, and getting the store open. That just doesn’t happen any more. It really takes just about twice as long to get a lease done. It probably takes a year as opposed to six months. You can’t lose money on a store you don’t open, so they’re just particularly careful about it. And what they’re trying to do on top of that is offload some of that capital expenditure back on the landlord. Retailers are asking for more tenant allowances.