Developers Rethink the Mall for the 21st Century

Elaine Misonzhnik / Retail Traffic

When Capri Capital Partners bought the 1.2-million-square-foot Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza in south Los Angeles for $136 million in 2006, the mall did not suffer from any serious issues with tenants. In fact, occupancy at the center has always been high, says Ken Lombard, a Capri partner in charge of redeveloping the mall. But the 30-year-old property felt outdated and bland. He graded its physical condition a “C-minus.”

What the mall had going for it were the demographics. There are more than a million people living within a three-mile radius of the property. The per capita income in the area is the highest of any diverse minority community in the country, Lombard says.

“This is a fantastic site,” says Jeff Green, president of Jeff Green Partners, a Mill Valley, Calif.-based retail real estate consulting firm. “It’s a very captive market; you’ve got to travel some distance to get to [another] regional retail center. What’s been the problem with the mall previously was just that it was old and not kept up. So if they make those physical changes, I think it will be a very good project.”

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