200,000- 500,000 sq. ft mall in rural area how to get funded for design and planning?

Question

Hi,

I looking for lots of advice. I dreamed up a state of the art retail concept store that is based around a outdoor mall retal. I am looking to purchase 80 acres of interstate farm land property in a rural area and master plan a outdoor mall. I can get tiff funding, rural economic development grants, and I have sold part my idea to people with gree building technology who have high intrest in building and promoting it. I have been quoted upwards of 2.5 million in branding and architectual conceptual modeling. However I was trying to find ways to cut down the planning figures. Once the plans are done I'm planning on selling the "retail space and concept to many diffrent companies. I am able to extend an enterprize zone to the location, At around 65~100 dollars per square foot.  I am working the sourounding land owners to allow me have full control over their property if it gets commercialy developed later on down the road as a direct result of my project. So that way i have compete power over who locates onto the land and can take a percentage for selling it.

THe problem is everyone wants to "SEE IT" and they want me to develop all the plans beforehand. How would I go about seeking investors for such a project to help with the planning phase? I am going to have to have it planned out and designed out conceptialy before i can sell it to the next set of people for the next phase.

If a investor was intrested in such a project what type of return could they demind just in planning?

Trent M. · Answer

correct it's going to take alot of seasoned knowlege to get it correctly off the ground and the key to it is to do it on a minimalistic scale. There are two issues. 1 the peice of real esate master planning and 2 the planning of how to sell it properly for the rest of the vision to work properly.

I think the true secrete to acheiving this is to finding the developmental dollars showing the vision to other companies and saying this is what i'm building are you willing to help sponors it. Nothing more powerfull than a young person with a passion and a younger pereson with support is even more deadly.

The real estate mall is what is needed to make my vision work. If someone were to build and lease it back.. My companies goal is to own the entire property at the end paying as minimal per square foot cost as possible. That would be the exit stragetigy for the real estate.

In a rural community am I not like a massive write off for larger developmental companies and other supporters? Supporting a rural project?

Either way. It may not be able to be built at once and all at one time however to take a piece of land and start slapping up buildings on it would be ruination and frankley stupid. Only adding after income is somewhat getting established. However I'm going to have to have a entire diffrent set of retail investors on flip side of the real estate.

i can get financed up to 20 million in real estate from rurual economic grants and doing it multiple uncondition ways is the smartest using the least of invester money as possible. I would just be missing the 25% to do it. And before that happens... I have to have a plan.

How can I find somenoe willing to invest into "Planning"?

My business model has absolutly no place to go but up up up and when starting from scratch it's a completly new and exciting thing.

I have had predictions of revenue from the rest of the model from 30-300 million a year however I have yet to fully understand the power of what I am wanting to build. I have no clue how retail professionals caculate those numbers but several have all agreed I have that type of potential or higher.

Kenneth Cameron · Answer

What everyone has said is true...but never be afraid of being unconventional in your financing. In this market I have had people throwing money at me for my projects because their investments are not showing the return they desire. Keep a stiff upper lip and do not accept less than you know you deserve for you idea. Please feel free to drop me a line if I can be of any service.

Craig Grella · Answer

you certainly have high ambition.
The scope of this project would put you in the class of a very large regional developer.  If you have not yet developed property on that scale it will be hard to pull something off of this magnitude.  Not impossible, but hard.

In this market, It will be impossible to finance without plans or initial approvals in place.  There aren't many, if any, lenders out there willing to take entitlement risk anymore, which means development money is coming out of your pocket.  unless you've got the cash you'll have to partner up with someone (or some company) that does.

You might want to research some of the successful regional developers in your area and share your vision with them.  before you do, you might want to get the land under contract or at least under your control with some kind of option that protects you from other more fiscally sound developers jumping in and stealing it from you.

As far as investors go, on a speculative development like this i'd look for a return in the high teens to low 20's. Especially if i was putting in seed capital.