A Chinese investment firm has bought a strip mall in Broward County for $4.15 million.
Jin Yang Real Estate Corporation bought the 19,493-square-foot retail plaza at 6450 West Commercial Blvd. in Lauderhill. The sale closed Thursday.
This is Jin Yang’s first U.S. real estate investment. The current tenants will stay put, but the new owners have an additional 5,000 square-foot parcel on the property that can be developed.
Franklin Street represented the seller, the New York-based investment group Balkani. The mall is anchored by a Tire Kingdom store and includes five other automobile-service businesses.
“Each year, more and more Chinese Investors are discovering South Florida as a place to buy homes, and now they are starting to discover this region as a place to invest in commercial real estate,” said Robert Granda, Franklin Street’s director of retail investment sales. “I see much more activity on the horizon.”
Granda said Jin Yang is looking to buy more property in Broward.
According to the National Association of Realtors, Chinese investors purchased more than $27.3 billion in U.S. properties in 2016, more than any other foreign country (Canada was a distant second at $8.9 billion). Florida accounted for the highest percentage of all real estate purchases by foreign investors in 2016 — 22 percent.
A report by the independent real estate economics firm Rosen Consulting Group in 2016 determined that South Florida is destined to become a top investment territory for Chinese buyers due to its location, infrastructure and competitive per square foot pricing compared to New York and Los Angeles.
