Two Former Target Stores Get New Life with Mid-America’s Help

Two former Target stores in Chicago have been redeveloped with the help of Mid-America, which provided asset advisory and brokerage services to the owner, a leading developer on the South Side.

The store in Chatham became a customer care center, community center and hub to support career paths in technology. The store in Morgan Park has been reborn as an employee workspace and community health, wellness and education center. The new occupiers, Discover Financial Services and Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Illinois, respectively, are credit tenants. The two projects are creating more than 1,500 new local jobs.

Both buildings were acquired vacant by DL3 Realty Advisors, LLC. Mid-America advised the owner on redevelopment options including repositioning the 130,000-square-foot spaces for multiple tenants. In both cases, there was interest from single tenants in other uses.

“The Mid-America team included retail real estate veterans with deep experience. They were very helpful advisors, and certainly strong partners in negotiation,” said Leon Walker of DL3.

“Great real estate lands on its feet, and we saw the potential of these assets to get new leases on life,” said Dick Spinell of Mid-America. “We’re pleased to have helped DL3 make the most of their assets, and to see these projects generating over 1,500 new jobs in the community.”

Mid-America’s work for DL3 continues. We advised the firm on other vacant space in their portfolio, and provide asset management and leasing services for another shopping center they own in Chicago.

About DL3 Realty Advisors, LLC

DL3 is a full-service real estate development and advisory firm that employs its nationally recognized Venture Development™ model to transform historically disinvested communities with high-impact commercial developments and affordable housing projects targeting working families.

After a successful career in corporate real estate, Attorney Leon I. Walker, DL3’s managing principal, has spent the past 20 years defying the odds through successful development projects that leverage innovative public-private partnerships and, in turn, inspire the next generation of Venture Developers. Over the past five years, DL3’s projects have generated more than 3,000 local jobs, and DL3 is working with America’s leading corporations to invest and create 10,000 new jobs in Chicago’s neighborhoods by 2030.