A shopping center along the U.S. 74 corridor in Matthews just sold for $87 million, marking one of the bigger retail property deals to hit the Charlotte suburbs this year. Windsor Square Shopping Center, a 657,000-square-foot property anchored by Sam’s Club, Kohl’s, At Home, Ross Dress for Less, PetSmart, DSW and 2nd & Charles, changed hands.
Waterstone Properties Group, a privately owned real estate investment and development company, bought the property. Windsor Square last sold for $70.1 million in November 2024, per county tax records cited in that report.
Windsor Square had previously traded for $38.4 million before its November 2024 sale for $70.1 million. At that earlier sale, the seven-building center occupied nearly 64 acres and was 97% leased, with Sam’s Club, Kohl’s, Ross Dress for Less, PetSmart and At Home among its tenants. The property sits off U.S. 74, about 1.5 miles north of Interstate 485, according to coverage of the 2024 transaction.
Business North Carolina notes the center is 99% occupied and generates 6.4 million annual visits, with shoppers sticking around for an average dwell time of 45 minutes. Within five miles of the property, there are about 181,000 residents with average household incomes approaching $120,000, figures the outlet attributes to Waterstone's own release on the deal.
Local Leasing Office and a Chairman's Confidence
Waterstone plans to open a satellite property management and leasing office at Windsor Square itself, while Boston-based Atlantic Retail will handle leasing for the property going forward. The moves fit into what the report describes as Waterstone expanding its operational footprint in North Carolina.
Neal Shalom, chair of Waterstone Properties Group, said Windsor Square is a proven, high-traffic destination and that Waterstone sees opportunity to build on its success. Richard Greer, the company's chief investment officer, said the acquisition adds meaningful scale to Waterstone's Southeast portfolio, per the same account. The company says it sees opportunities to create value through leasing and active management, and describes itself as committed to Windsor Square and to North Carolina more broadly.
A Portfolio Built on National Reach
Company-wide, Waterstone manages more than 4 million square feet of commercial real estate across 51 properties and counts more than 375 national and local tenants among its roster. The firm reports assets under management exceeding $1 billion and also holds more than 400 multifamily and residential units.
Why the Charlotte Retail Market Is Drawing Buyers
The Windsor Square sale lands amid tight conditions in Charlotte’s retail sector. Charlotte’s retail market has some of the lowest vacancy rates, according to a Marcus & Millichap report.
The same report said older single-tenant properties drove strong absorption, while newer retail space saw softer demand. South Charlotte and University City were flagged among the metro's top-performing submarkets, and Marcus & Millichap expects vacancy to keep declining through the rest of 2026 as asking rents continue to climb.
A recent Raleigh-area transaction offers another measure of investor appetite for large North Carolina shopping centers: Knightdale Marketplace sold for $86.7 million on Sept. 16, 2026. At 323,113 square feet, it is about half Windsor Square’s size, and JLL described it as fully occupied, with anchors including Academy Sports + Outdoors, Best Buy, TJ Maxx and Burlington. The sale provides a statewide comparison, though location, tenant mix and property characteristics differ, as detailed in JLL’s transaction announcement.
The latest market figures vary with the segment measured. Colliers put Charlotte’s overall retail vacancy at 2.84% in the second quarter of 2026, with 217,225 square feet of net absorption. Marcus & Millichap’s third-quarter report breaks out vacancy by format: 2.7% for single-tenant space and 5.8% for multi-tenant properties. The figures underscore that a tight overall market can still have different leasing conditions across retail types, as shown in Colliers’ second-quarter market report and Marcus & Millichap’s latest Charlotte report.
