Australian retail giant Westfield has agreed to buy 15 US stores from Federated Department Stores.
The department stores, which trade as Macys, Robinsons-May and Hecht’s, are located in 11 Westfield shopping centres in California, Ohio, Connecticut and Maryland.
The properties are part of a package of 84 stores Federated Department Stores said it would sell following its acquisition of the May Department Stores Company last year.
Westfield will acquire the15 stores in two separate transactions.
The acquisition of 12 of the stores will be in exchange for 12 department store properties currently owned by Westfield and leased to May Company of which only two are in Westfield shopping centres.
The current income from those sites is $7.88m pa (£4.54m).
In the second transaction, Westfield will buy three stores for $18.5m (£10.6m).
Separately, Westfield and Federated have agreed on 18 new redevelopments at Westfield-owned shopping centres.
Westfield managing director Peter Lowy said: “The acquisition creates new opportunities to further reinvest in and improve our portfolio, enabling over $2bn (£1.15bn) of new redevelopments to be initiated in the next four years.”
References: EGi News 17/02/06
