IBF Properties Secures $149M Refi For Walgreens Portfolio

Tauro Capital Advisors has closed a one-year $149 million floating bridge loan on a 24-property Walgreens portfolio spanning nine states. The stores are located primarily in Tennessee, Wisconsin, and Alabama and encompass 314,852 square feet in total.

The financing transaction was led by Matt Bucaro, a managing partner at Tauro in Los Angeles, and closed in less than 45 days. In a statement announcing the deal, Tauro said the IBF Properties, which purchased the properties in 2021, is buying retail assets occupied by investment-grade tenants en masse and plans to create a REIT to hold and operate the portfolio. Bucaro said that his team secured and arranged the refinancing to replace the higher interest rate acquisition financing, which he said is intended to bridge the gap until the REIT is formed and more permanent debt is placed.

“Juggling 24 surveys, SNDA’s, and estoppels was challenging in our time frame,” Bucaro said. “Also, the cost of rate caps increased dramatically over the duration of loan closing. Fortunately, we were able to negotiate the lender to waive this requirement for a significantly lower fee.”

IBF Properties LLC was the borrower and Benefit Street Partners was the lender for the bridge refinance.

Walgreens has closed 1,000 stores in the past few years as part of what its divisional VP of real estate Chris Noble calls “portfolio optimization.” When the company has been unable to negotiate a buyout with a landlord, it has found other tenants to take leases, Noble told attendees of GlobeSt’s Net Lease Spring Conference last month.