Bruce Schanzer, president and CEO of Cedar Realty Trust, Inc. (NYSE: CDR), participated in a video interview in conjunction with Nareit’s REITweek: Virtual Investor Conference (held June 2-4).
Schanzer said that Cedar’s focus on grocery-anchored retail is a part of the company’s DNA. He said that when he joined Cedar in 2011, the REIT had roughly 140 disparate assets.
“Since then, we’ve sold just about every asset that was not grocery-anchored or in the D.C. to Boston corridor, and used some of those proceeds to purchase additional grocery-anchored shopping centers within our footprint,” he said.
Beyond grocery stores, Schanzer said that essential businesses have also performed well throughout the pandemic. In Cedar’s portfolio, that includes banks, pharmacies, wholesale clubs, hardware stores, and liquor stores. Schanzer also said that Cedar was showing strong rent collections and expected them to improve even further, with April at 73% collected and May around 71% collected.
Schanzer added that while he anticipates long-term changes post-pandemic, he expects extreme measures like limiting the number of customers in stores to eventually ease up.