Berkshire Mall sold to New York company
Berkshire Mall has been sold to a New York-based commercial real estate and investment firm.
Namdar Realty Group took over the 50-year-old enclosed shopping center in Wyomissing in mid-July from Delaware-based Allied Property Group. A woman who answered the phone at Namdar’s headquarters in Great Neck, N.Y., on Monday morning confirmed the transaction.
A sales price was not immediately available.
Like other malls across the country, Berkshire has been hit by the decline of brick-and-mortar retail and has lost two of its three anchors. The Bon-Ton closed in 2018, and Sears, which was an original anchor from 1970, followed last year. Boscov’s, which came to the mall in 2002, is the only remaining anchor.
The 800,000-square-foot mall also has steadily lost stores in its interior such as Coventry Corners, Belden Jewelers and The Gap.
Berks County’s other enclosed mall, Fairgrounds Square in Muhlenberg Township, was sold to Hull Property Group in 2016 for $1.16 million. The Georgiabased company is in the process of tearing down about 68% of the 547,879-square-foot building to create green space between the remaining parts of the structure that includes Boscov’s and Burlington.
Michele Bare, Wyomissing’s zoning and code officer and economic development coordinator, said she has had brief contact with Namdar representatives in recent weeks and a meeting is planned between the borough and the company to discuss the property’s future.
With the mall located where two of Berks’ major arteries — Routes 422 and 222 — merge for a short stretch, the mall is on a prime piece of land. The mall is also the base of a shopping district that stretches up both State Hill and Papermill roads through the northern part of Wyomissing and into Spring Township.
“This is a critical property in the eyes of borough council, the borough’s economic development group and the borough as a whole,” Bare said. “We want to find out what their plans are.”
Bare said after observing Muhlenberg’s dispute with Hull over taxation issues at Fairgrounds Square, Wyomissing is more than willing to work with the owners to find a use for the property.
The mall is in a commercial and industrial development overlay district and there are several options for Namdar, Bare said. The district includes such properties as the former VF Outlet Center that is now occupied by the Knitting Mills that is a mix of office and commercial space.
Like VF Outlet, Berkshire Mall was a shopping mecca for customers from miles around. As one of the first enclosed malls in eastern Pennsylvania outside of the Philadelphia area, it opened to great fanfare in February 1970 with Sears, Wanamaker’s and Lit Brothers as the original anchors.
On its website, Namdar says it has 52 million square feet in commercial real estate. It was founded in 1999 on Long Island with the purchase of a single store front and averages about 20 acquisitions annually.
The company, along with partner Mason Asset Management, owns properties nationwide, including both enclosed and openair malls, as well as office and residential buildings. Regionally, Namdar owns Cressona Mall, North Manheim Township, Schuylkill County; Chambersburg Mall, Franklin County; and North Hanover Mall, York County.