AUSTIN-The American Electronics Association and a biotech developer have signed leases for an aggregate 5,175 sf that enables both to expand. The AeA's spot at 1402 San Antonio will provide office space for its South Texas Council.

NEW BRAUNFELS, TX-Polaris Outfitters has acquired a 17,695-sf property that will be converted from industrial to retail. The expanded New Braunfels site will provide land for customers to test drive land-based products

SAN ANTONIO-The city's 11th Popeye's restaurant will open at 3100 Broadway in the northeast submarket while Twelfth Street Warehouse is heading to a 7,000-sf spot in the southern tier. Grubb & Ellis brokers in San Antonio have closed the deals.

AUSTIN-Denver-based AIMCO has closed a $49.6-million refinancing package, arranged by Holliday Fenoglio Fowler. The deal encompasses Austin's The Hills at the Arboretum and multifamily complexes in Miami and Lombard, IL.

AUSTIN-Illinois-based Career Education Corp. has taken the reins to the Texas Culinary Academy in Austin. On the front burner is an expansion, says the acquiring company. The 15-year-old Texas school is located at 6020 Dillard Dr. in the city's north submarket.

AUSTIN-Austin is slowly nipping away at its vast amount of sublease space. For the second reporting period, Mike Buls has tracked a decline, even in the northwest submarket, which accounted for 63% of the available sf at one point.

AUSTIN-A Raleigh, NC-based clothes cleaner is heading to Texas. Four shops will open in the Austin region and one in Houston. The firm boasts a technique that "cleans green" in an environmentally friendly process developed by a North Carolina professor.

AUSTIN-Crescent Real Estate Equities has sold an 80% interest in the 390,000-sf Bank One Tower in the CBD. An affiliate of Fairfield, CT-based General Electric Pension Trust has taken the stake, striking a deal that keeps Crescent as asset manager.