Daily Trade News

Kohl’s real estate sale on the table after deal talks fall apart


People walk near a Kohl’s department store entranceway on June 07, 2022 in Doral, Florida.

Joe Raedle | Getty Images

Kohl’s might not be selling its business after all. But it’s now looking to sell some of its real estate, reversing its prior stance.

The retailer on Friday announced it terminated deal talks with The Vitamin Shoppe owner Franchise Group, confirming CNBC’s reporting from Thursday evening. Instead, Kohl’s said, it will continue to operate as a standalone public company.

Kohl’s for months has been pressured by activist firms including Macellum Advisors to consider a sale of the company, in large part to unlock the value tied up in Kohl’s real estate.

Macellum has argued that Kohl’s should sell some of its real estate and lease it back as a way to unlock capital, particularly during tough times. Kohl’s, however, has been resistant to so-called sale leaseback transactions, at least at such a large scale.

The company did complete a small sale-leaseback deal earlier on in the Covid pandemic, according to Peter Boneparth, chair of Kohl’s board. It recognized a gain of $127 million by selling and leasing back its San Bernardino e-commerce fulfillment and distribution centers.

On Friday, though, Kohl’s explicitly noted in its press release that its board is currently reevaluating ways that the retailer can monetize its real estate. Franchise Group had been planning to finance a portion of its Kohl’s acquisition by selling a chunk of Kohl’s real estate to another party and then leasing it back. This likely gave Kohl’s an idea of what sort of value it could fetch for its owned bricks-and-mortar stores and distribution centers.

“Now you’ve got an environment where financing has changed so much that it may in fact be more attractive to use real estate as a monetization vehicle,” Boneparth told CNBC in a phone interview.

“When you combine that with what we think the levels of the stock are, it becomes a much different exercise than it was in a previous financing environment,” he explained. “It’s no secret that Kohl’s has a very big asset on the balance sheet: Real estate.”

As of Jan. 29, Kohl’s owned 410 locations, leased another 517 and operated ground leases on 238 of its shops. All of its owned real estate was valued at a little more than $8 billion at that time, an annual filing shows.

Pros and cons



Read More: Kohl’s real estate sale on the table after deal talks fall apart