Urstadt Biddle Properties Inc., a real estate investment trust based in Greenwich, announced it has completed the sale of a Meriden shopping center in an all-cash deal.
The 315,000-square-foot Townline Square Shopping Center sold for $44.5 million. Jim Koury, of real estate services company HFF, represented the sellers and found the buyer.
Urstadt Biddle said it will use the proceeds to repay revolving debt that was used primarily to acquire grocery anchored shopping centers last year and this year. The company estimates it will record a gain on sale of the property of approximately $21 million in its fiscal quarter ending Oct. 31.
Willing L. Biddle, president and CEO of Urstadt Biddle Properties, said the company set a goal about two years ago to sell off certain properties located outside the New York metro area. The company has sold warehouse properties in Dallas and St. Louis, a shopping center in Massachusetts, and now Townline Square in Meriden, which the company owned since 1996.
The proceeds have been used to buy shopping centers in New Jersey, Greenwich and Harrison, New York and to reduce debt.
“We now have a portfolio almost exclusively located in the suburbs around New York City with an occupancy rate of almost 97 percent and a leverage level that continues to be among the lowest in the real estate investment trust industry,” Biddle said.
