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Manuel German dba Galerias Magelos of Hermossillo, Mexico purchased a property across the road from The Bridges at 3640 S Campbell Avenue in Tucson for its first US location. The 10,000 sq. ft. building was purchased for[mepr-show rules=”58038″]$520,000 ($52 PSF) from Duffy Warehouses, LLC of Tucson (Gary Duffy, manager).

Galerias Magelos, a Mexican furniture store, will expand operations at the property as a showroom / warehouse. Following in the steps of its sister business, Galerias Magelos that has been in business for about 15 years in Hermosillo, the Tucson store will be its second store for furniture imports / sales and interior decorating services for clients. German has been an interior decorator for about 15 years.

The property sold leased to Olde Inke, a media and data storage depot, that will remain in place until June when its lease is up and the new owner can begin tenant improvements. The new store opening is anticipated for sometime this Fall.

Ed Henne of Long Realty in Tucson represented the seller in the transaction and Gary Best of KW Commercial and Luz Moreno of Keller Williams Southern Arizona represented the buyer.

Contact Henne at (520) 918-5989. Best and Moreno can be reached at (520) 615-8400.[/mepr-show]

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Cornerstone Hospital of Southeast Arizona, LLC of Dallas, TX (Louise Cassidy, CEO) exercised a purchase option on the building at 7220 E Rosewood St in Tucson for [mepr-show rules=”58038″]$7 million ($166 PSF) that it leased since 2005 from Medical Properties Trust of Birmingham, AL affiliate, MPT of Tucson, LLC. Cornerstone Hospital is a 34-bed long term acute care facility for patients who no longer require the services of an intensive care unit, but still need more intensive care than that offered by traditional rehabilitation, skilled nursing or sub-acute care settings.

Nexbank of Dallas, TX financed the transaction.

The seller, Medical Properties Trust (NYSE:MPW) is a REIT specialized exclusively in real estate investments of acute care facilities of all kinds with long-term triple-net leases. MPT claims to be the only healthcare REIT focusing exclusively on hospitals, acquiring and developing rehabilitation hospitals, women’s and children’s hospitals, regional and community hospitals, as well as ambulatory surgery centers and other specialized, single-discipline facilities.

MPT acquired the property in 2008 from another healthcare REIT, Health Care Property Investors, Inc. of Long Beach, CA for slightly over $7 million ($7,010,870). The purchase option with Cornerstone was conveyed to MPT in that transaction.

The CEO of Cornerstone Hospital, Louise Cassidy reported that there would not be any changes to the hospital’s normal operations.[/mepr-show]

Picor Commercial Real Estate an affiliate of Cushman & Wakefield released its ‘Marketbeat Retail Snapshot’ for Q1 2013 last week. The report indicates little change in retail vacancies, with little more than a percentage point in movement since Q3 2009, “for years, Tucson’s retail vacancy has inched up and down”.

To see Picor’s full Retail report go to: https://picor.com/downloads/tucson_ret_1q13.htm

From a national viewpoint, consumers pulled back spending slightly in March, according to the Census Bureau, with total US retail and food services down by 0.4% month-over-month and spending up by 2.8% compared with March 2012. The bureau adjusts spending estimates for seasonal variations, holidays and the like, but not for price changes.

Not many retailers saw sale advances in March, according to both Picor and the Bureau reports. Furniture and home furnishing sales were up 0.9% month-over-month, and 2.8% over March 2012. Picor reported increased mattress stores activity, and restaurants and bars nationally experienced a 0.4% growth. However, according to Greg Furrier of Picor, locally “restaurants’ appetites (were) largely restricted to the Campbell corridor and downtown submarkets”.

Nationally, non-store retailers, such as catalog and internet sales were up 0.3% for month-over-month and 13.5% over March 2012. The losers for the month were electronics stores that saw sales chipped away by 1.6%, down 3.2% compared to March 2012, and gas stations down by 2.2% month-over-month, with gas prices down in March from February highs, and down a mere 0.4% from March 2012. It should be noted that most categories of retailers did see a year-over-year increase in sales.

Realtor.com, operated by the National Association of Realtors, reports that in 134 of the 146 markets tracked, housing inventory decreased since last year. Here at home, the Tucson Association of Realtors reports inventory shrunk by 544 listings, or 4%, compared to March 2012. The decline is due to a combination of sales to homeowners, investors, and the slower pace of new development and foreclosures.

Consumer sentiment is down slightly for the month of April, according to the Reuters /University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index. It came in at 76.4 in April, down from 78.6 in March, but the end-April sentiment level could have been much worse considering that the mid-month reading was 72.3. Consumer sentiment has been bouncing around, but mostly on the low side of historic averages. Maybe some consumers are feeling a little bit better with lower gas prices.

As one seasoned Tucson CRE investor, who prefers to be unidentified, commented, “As long as the trend is not declining, it’s all good news.” This may be the best approach to take when reading Q1 2013 market reports.