Ashco Inc. bought the former Thomasville furniture store near The Markets at Town Center for conversion into the Town Center Medical Plaza.
Ashcenter at St. Johns LLC paid almost $2.3 million for the 13,200-square-foot store Aug. 19. The 1.27-acre property is at 4853 Big Island Drive.
Ashco said the medical retail space will be available in spaces of about 2,200 square feet to the entire building.
Ashco is led by president Edward Ashurian, who manages the LLC that bought the property.
Jacksonville-based Ashco bought the property from DH Jax L.L.C., an investor group run by The Chambers Group of Charlotte, North Carolina.
The store was built in 2007.
Ashco said the plaza is “medical retail transformed, capturing the current demand for a Class A medical and retail experience.”
The Thomasville store closed after parent company Heritage Home Group LLC, based in High Point, North Carolina, filed in July 2018 for Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization to pay down $280 million in debt.
Ashco owns neighborhood shopping centers around Jacksonville, including the San Marco Train Station and the San Marco Union Hall.
Ashco Inc. has been family-owned and operated for more than 40 years in Jacksonville, according to its website. The Ash family has been developing and managing retail centers for over three decades.
Jacksonville-based Cantrell & Morgan Inc. listed the Thomasville property and represented the seller exclusively.
Cantrell & Morgan co-CEO Chris Morgan said the group was “happy to have an opportunity to facilitate the transaction with Ashco.”
Tiffany Ash, vice president of leasing and acquisition for Ashco, called Town Center “the epitome of high end retail in North Florida for medical-retail space.
The project is adjacent to St. Johns Town Center.
“We feel the St. Johns Town Center is a perfect fit to our award-winning portfolio of Class A centers,” she said by email.
“Ashco prides itself on building communities, not just shopping centers. This ethos in the process of real estate development helps to build the landscape for successful tenants,” she said.
Ash said many Ashco tenants are reporting gains of 20% to 30% over last year, despite the COVID-19 pandemic.
Ash said that as part of Ashco’s Next Generation of Shopping Centers initiative, the Town Center Medical Plaza will feature outdoor space for patrons, stadium lighting in the parking lot, and 24/7 accessible closed-circuit cameras on the premises.
She said Ashco works to create a live-work-play environment.
