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Primaris Acquires CF Lime Ridge in Hamilton for $416M

Primaris REIT has acquired CF Lime Ridge Mall in Hamilton for $416 million from Cadillac Fairview. The deal boosts the REIT's national footprint and unlocks leasing opportunities.
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Looks like a name change coming, and now who knows if any of the south planned work will happen. Although with $416MM forked over for the asset Primaris I am sure will be thinking of ways to monitize the underutilized mall and broader site.
 
Yea, this is probably dead.

CF has underinvested in Limeridge for a while though. Primaris should hopefully bring some sort of investment in the property through it's purchase to get lease-up higher. There is a lot of vacancy in the mall right now.
 
This is a positive development, I think. Lime Ridge is a solid mid-tier enclosed mall with good fundamentals. While CF definitely put in the minimum amount of money they could, it was at least spent well and resulted in the place being kept in good shape through cosmetic upgrades and functional maintenance (e.g. escalators and superficial damage are repaired, the place is well heated/cooled). Moreover, they eventually pivoted quite successfully from the loss of Sears by securing the largest Tesla service centre in the GTAH.

Obviously the loss of The Bay is significant, but its two level configuration and location at the far end of a mall present Primaris with some options for how to proceed. If they are fortunate enough to land a whale like Simons, which I think is unlikely for the market, that would let the mall do an almost one-for-one replacement of the former Bay CRU. In the far more likely case that they can line up a small-format anchor like Sail or Decathalon, they could demise and retrofit the two-level Bay CRU to suit the tenant and then renovate the remaining Bay space to permit an extension of the existing two-level mall racetrack into the footprint of the Bay. This would result in a longer two-level retail corridor with conventionally sized CRUs and a smaller format anchor at the end.

I don't think that the market would support residential development at Lime Ridge at this time, or the foreseeable future, but Primaris would be smart to start some high-level master planning work and even get an OPA approved while there is such a strong appetite for supporting higher density residential growth.

I don't think anyone should hold their breath for a second LRT line in Hamilton in the first half of the century, but if there were a logical southern terminus of such a line, it would be Lime Ridge Mall. Starting to do some long-term thinking about that would be warranted when there's a change in ownership and with redevelopment potential (as measured by lot coverage) being one of Primaris' acquisition criteria.
 
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There are substantial as-of-right permissions on Limeridge already - there isn't really a need for a master plan. The intensification CF was planning was as-of-right.
 
Upper James Walmart is smaller than their preferred footprint of 150-180,000sf for a modern walmart at about 120,000sf, but not so much so that I think they would be desperate for a move. Barton Centre is only 80,000sf! There are tonne of walmarts across the GTA in that size range.

Walmart also surprises me as they have not been growing their presence in Canada for years. Maybe that's changing now, but other than a few tweaks here and there they haven't made significant shifts in store footprints in almost a decade now. They have opened only 9 new stores in Canada since 2015 and none since 2020.
 
Is there enough demand to keep Upper James and open a new one? There was the one at Upper Sherman and Mohawk that closed and was not replaced.
 
BCTed said:
Is there enough demand to keep Upper James and open a new one? There was the one at Upper Sherman and Mohawk that closed and was not replaced.
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Well that Walmart is pretty busy. I think it’s plausible the south mountain could use a Walmart, seeing as the James/Fennell one is now the only one for the entire mountain proper until you get to Stoney Creek Mountain or Ancaster’s, which are both pretty far by comparison.

While I’d think Walmart would prefer somewhere greenfield south of Rymal, the Sherman location may have been a temporary attempt to serve this catchment and see how big the market is. Limeridge getting a store that has groceries would be pretty great, but Fortinos is also right there- albeit serving a likely-different customer base.

There also isn’t a Walmart west of Ottawa in the lower city, including Dundas nor Aldershot. Feels like these are Zellers/Target-sized holes.
 
They used to have a second location on the mountain slightly east of there and closed it. Seems funny to open another one again.
 
BrenWilson said:
They used to have a second location on the mountain slightly east of there and closed it. Seems funny to open another one again.
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I don't know if they closed it because of the market or because it was a small store with a crappy layout in a crappy plaza that may have had handicapped performance because of those constraints.
 
Things I'd love to see a Limeridge. A Walmart is one of them. I have a list of things that would require some expansion, the loss of parking would require a parking garage or underground parking. The goal is for the mall to be a live work play hub, a true reason to want to go there and spend the day not just grab what you need and get out.
  1. Walmart
  2. Uniqlo
  3. Best Buy or Visions Electronics
  4. The Rec Room or Dave & Busters
  5. VIP Theatre (there are none in Hamilton, could be connected to The Rec Room)
  6. Apple Store
  7. Netflix House (seeing that they film so many of their shows here)
  8. Chic-Fil-A
  9. Jersey Mikes
  10. A Food/Boutique Market Hall
  11. Miniso Land
  12. More Full Serve Restaurants (hello Cheesecake Factory)
  13. More Entertainment Options
  14. Condos/Apartments connected directly to the mall.
  15. Outdoor Park for events and more greenspace in general with mini parkettes.
  16. More mid and upscale clothing stores.
  17. Simons
  18. Pop Mart
 
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