Franklin Street’s Retail Services team has been selected to lead leasing for The Promenade at Town Center, a 230,000-square-foot mixed-use development in Palm Coast, Florida. The development includes 204 residential units and 57,000 square feet of commercial space, targeting a mix of retail, restaurant, and professional office users. Persimmon Capital Partners is the owner and developer of The Promenade. The project broke ground this past July and is scheduled to be delivered in early 2026.

The Promenade, located in the 2,050-acre Palm Coast Town Center neighborhood, will feature a mix of retailers, coffee shops, restaurants, service providers and working spaces on its ground floor. The project’s upper floors will offer studio, one and two-bedroom apartment residences with balconies.

Palm Coast is the largest city in Flagler County, the third fastest-growing county in Florida, which is the fastest-growing state in the country.

Franklin Street Properties Corp. REIT sold Pershing Park Plaza for $34 million, a loss of more than $11 million. In 2016, Franklin Street bought the 160,000-square-foot building for $45.5 million. 28th Street Ventures was the buyer. Will Yowell, Ryan Reethof, Jay O’Meara and Justin Parsonnet with CBRE’s Institutional Office Properties team in Atlanta represented the seller. The nine-story building at 1420 Peachtree Street is where Peachtree and West Peachtree streets meet.

Franklin Street announced the sale in its third-quarter earnings report, saying since December 2020 the company said it has sold select office properties to pay down debt. It allocated $27.4 million from the Pershing Park sale to repay debt.

In it’s quarterly report, Franklin’s George Carter said, “Our directly-owned real estate portfolio of 15 owned properties, totaling approximately 5.0 million square feet, was approximately 70.4% leased as of September 30, 2024, compared to approximately 74.0% leased as of December 31, 2023.”

What to do with underperforming malls has vexed mall owners primarily since COVID-19. Besides shuttering sinking stores, owners have devised a plan that basically rigs them business. Build apartments and hotels on the property. CBL Properties and RaganSmith Associates have decided to do just that at the Cool Springs Galleria in Franklin, Tennessee, just outside Nashville.

The Nashville Business Journal reports the proposed plan includes the development of 76,700 square feet of retail and restaurant space, around 600 apartment units across two buildings and a 120-room hotel in the parking lots west of the Galleria, wedged between the mall and Mallory Lane. The project will be completed in six phases and include adding open green spaces to the 86.5-acre mall site. It still has to be okayed by the local planning board.

CBL Properties opened Cool Springs Galleria in 1991. It is Tennessee’s largest mall, with more than one million square feet of retail space and more than 150 stores.

Courtesy of Franklin Street

Franklin Street has appointed Matthew Harrell as CEO.

The founder and chief executive of Tampa-based Franklin Street is passing the leadership baton to one of his executives as the full-service commercial real estate brokerage plans further expansion in the Sun Belt.

Andrew Wright is stepping back from the top job at Franklin Street, the firm announced Monday, to be replaced by Chief Revenue Officer Matthew Harrell as the new CEO as part of a planned succession.

Wright is stepping back from day-to-day activity, but he said he will remain chairman of the board of directors and be involved in the growth of the firm moving forward. Franklin Street operates seven business divisions: investment sales, tenant representation, landlord representation, capital advisory, insurance, property management and project management. 

“We are very much aligned in our core values,” Harrell told Bisnow. “This has been a strategic plan for this transition for a number of years.”

Franklin Street was founded in 2006 and today has 300 professionals with offices in Tampa, Fort Lauderdale, Jacksonville, Orlando, Miami, Atlanta and Chicago and has conducted $7B in transaction value, the company said in a release. Under Harrell’s leadership, Franklin Street plans to continue its national expansion by looking to recruit brokers and acquire firms for all its business lines in high-growth markets, especially in Dallas, Houston, Austin, Nashville and Charlotte.

Last year, the firm’s revenues grew 50% to $1.43B, Franklin Street said in a release. Harrell said Franklin Street is particularly focused on growing its capital market services division in the Sun Belt.

“Capital markets is a strategic line of business that we feel can give the most opportunity to feed other lines of business in the long term,” he said. “But again, what we’re looking for is the people behind those businesses.”

Harrell was named chief revenue officer last year and was tasked with recruiting and merger and acquisition activities for Franklin Street. Prior to that, Harrell served as managing director of the firm’s insurance services division and a member of the board of directors since 2012.

“Over the past 13 years, no one has been as integral to Franklin Street’s growth, success and quality of culture as Matt Harrell,” Wright said in a press release. “There is unlimited potential for what we can accomplish in the coming years, and I am excited to see Matt lead us there.”