Ideal size lot for standalone retail or small strip mall?

[Stephanie Medellin]

What is a decent size lot to build a standalone retail store or fast food restaurant?  What about a small strip mall?  The lot obviously needs to allow for parking, enough space to drive in and out, and the building, as well as any setbacks from other properties?  Let's assume the whole lot is flat and usable.

[Jessica Zolotorofe]

Hi Stephanie!

The rule of thumb for land is something like 5,000sf building per half acre, but you have to factor in parking, which is typically 4-5 spaces per 1000sf (you can check the zoning requirements for your location for the exact number), and then whether the tenant will want a drive-through, which will require additional land, and of course all of the things you mentioned, setback and landscaping requirements, ingress and egress, etc. A lot of the national tenants have development requirements online, so that will give you an idea of how much land they need, or how big of a building they will take and how much parking they require and you can kind of extrapolate. Even though 5,000sf can technically fit on half an acre, certain tenants, like McDonalds, for example, look for an acre to an acre and a quarter with a 4,000-4,5000sf building.

A decent sized retail center is probably 10,000-15,000sf, of course that can vary tremendously depending on whether you have a big anchor tenant, how many units you need, etc., but 10-15,000 is definitely doable on about an acre and a half, depending on your local zoning requirements.

A tenant like CVS usually wants an acre and a half to 2 acres and their buildings are usually something like 14,000-15,000sf.

So, I guess the answer is that there is no good answer! But hopefully some of that helped you get a better idea :)