An East Memphis Shopping Center that has undergone a major transformation in recent years has been sold to a Texas property management group…according to filings with Shelby County Register of Deeds.
Poplar Commons — on Poplar Avenue at Perkins Extd. — was sold by Seritage to Memphis Poplar Commons Associates LLC, which is controlled by Texas-based Fidelis.
Fidelis owns properties in the retail, industrial, healthcare, and multifamily sectors. It primarily operates in Texas, although the group has some properties scattered throughout the Midwest and South. The group has one other property in Tennessee, a shopping center in Knoxville.
Seritage is a Sears real estate spin-off that mostly buys and redevelops shopping centers, then sells them for a profit. In 2022, the company had more than $730 million in gross proceeds from sales of assets, and already has $232 million in sales as of Feb. 2, 2023.
Seritage purchased Poplar Commons from Sears Holdings in 2015 for $8.1 million. Back then, it was an aging Sears store with a detached auto center. That store closed in 2016, then Seritage tore it down and turned the property into a strong shopping center.
Seritage took out $42.6 million in debt on the property in November 2019. The shopping center was one piece of collateral in an overall $1.979 billion loan from Berkshire Hathaway Life Insurance Co. of Nebraska. The Poplar Commons mortgage was satisfied this month in advance of the sale, according to the Shelby County Register of Deeds.
Chase Bank is set to open one of its initial Memphis locations in Poplar Commons. It is also home to Hopdoddy, a Nordstrom Rack, and an Ulta Beauty.
The new owner, Fidelis, mostly focuses on Class A retail spaces, according to its website. The group focuses on anchoring its shopping centers with name-brand national clients and grocers, as well as owning and managing local neighborhood centers such as Poplar Commons.
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