St. Cloud Mall is getting new owners in an $80 million deal

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Two New York-based companies, Contrarian Properties and Spinoso Real Estate Group, have acquired the Crossroads Center in St. Cloud for just under $80 million in a deal disclosed in public filings Wednesday.

This sale is the second of 2024 for the mall, as in January a group called Trigild was appointed trustee of the property after the previous owner, Brookfield Properties, failed to make a mortgage payment since March 2020.

At nearly 900,000 square feet, Crossroads Center is the largest mall in the state other than the Twin Cities. The stores include JC Penny, Macy’s and Scheels. Target owns the location connected to the mall, according to Stearns County property tax records.

There is a balloon payment for the property of $79,867,741, the same amount the building was purchased for, that goes into effect in May 2027.

The property is located on the border of Waite Park and St. Cloud.

Matt Hazelton, a senior director of Capital Markets at JLL, said the acquisition by Contrarian and Spinoso is a debt assumption of Trigild (the court-appointed receiver), so the actual quoted costs “do not fully reflect the true situation” therefore it’s such a high price.

“I guess what’s going on here is the existing lender had to approve these guys as a new borrower and make some kind of deal with them,” Hazelton said in an interview Thursday. “I bet no proceeds were transferred to the previous owner. So all their shares were gone.”

As for the real market value of the property, Hazelton said he was hesitant to put a figure on it, but said the $27.6 million sale of Maplewood Mall in June 2022 or the sale of Northtown Mall worth of $31 million in August 2023 is more indicative of the current market.

According to a Catylist listing for the mall, located at 4101 W. Division St. in St. Cloud, the property is 100% leased. Hazelton said he doesn’t know the lease terms of the anchor tenants, so he’s not exactly sure of the property’s rental strength, but said trustees don’t bode well for tenants.

“When properties are in receivership, it’s usually not a good idea to rent them out because there isn’t as much money to maintain properties and people aren’t as proactive,” he says. “Shopping centers are expensive, they are capital-intensive properties to operate.”

Hazelton said the property will likely benefit from a change of ownership.

“Hopefully the new owner can have a good plan for it and breathe new life into it and come up with a good strategy to make it sustainable in the future,” Hazelton said.

In a press release, Spinoso said it would bring “a wealth of experience” in maximizing the Crossroads Center’s potential and transforming it.

While this appears to be Spinoso’s first foray into real estate in Minnesota, according to its online portfolio, the group owns and manages 41 malls across the country, including malls in Wisconsin and Iowa.

“We are excited to introduce our unique focus on leasing and development to Crossroads Center,” said Carmen Spinoso, CEO of the group. “Our goal is to develop, redevelop and establish Crossroads Center as the premier shopping and entertainment destination in the St. Cloud area.”

According to the press release, both Contrarian and Spinoso will handle the management, leasing, redevelopment, operations and marketing of the St. Cloud shopping center.

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