Nationally, Restaurants Hard to Sell

From AgentGenius, online blog
Thousands of restaurants close: Are you ready to sell the inventory?
By Erica Ramus on July 30, 2010 | 11 Responses

Over 5,000 restaurants across the United States closed their doors in the past 12 months. Most of them were independents, not chains. After you get over mourning the demise of your favorite Friday night spot, thoughts turn to how are we going to sell these properties?

The statistics from this week’s news shouldn’t surprise anyone. Early on in the recession Americans started cutting back on their dining out. Some cut out restaurant meals completely to save money. Those those who still ate out regularly moved to less expensive joints. Fine dining became a luxury for most Americans the past few years.

Restaurants cut expenses and adapted to the new economy (blue plate specials and coupons), utilized creative marketing techniques (Facebook and Groupon) or hung on for dear life.

Now it seems like in 2009-2010 that line snapped. With no more ways to cut costs and record level unemployment numbers thinning their dining crowds to a trickle, many independent restauranteurs threw in the towel.

In my area, there’s one restaurant that has changed hands three times in the past four years. Driving by today it looked dark at lunchtime, and someone commented to me that the location must be the kiss of death if it’s closed again.
(Question: are some locations truly jinxed or just so poor nothing could succeed there? This particular location is the middle of a small strip mall with frontage on a very busy road. It’s got easy access and visibility. What gives? Just three owners in a row who don’t know what they’re doing? Or something more?)

How do you sell this thing?
If you’re a real estate broker and you list a closed restaurant, what’s the best way to sell or market it? Obviously the best and easiest solution is to find another restauranteur (or chef who always wanted to own his own place — see prior paragraph for that downside). If the kitchen and equipment are in good working order, perhaps you can find someone who just wants to step into the prior owner’s shoes and turn the business around. That’s your dream deal.

If leased equipment has been returned and the place is a mess, one solution is to clean it out and perhaps even gut it. Make it a plain vanilla shell so that any business could see themselves there, not just as a restaurant. If it’s got a good location, plenty of parking, what else could use the building? What is the location best suited for?

Survey the neighborhood
What is missing in the neighborhood? Do a survey of local businesses and see where the gaps are. Ask people what they’d like to see in the spot. What kind of retail or services are out of the area, that they have to drive to find? What do locals wish was there?

I had a closed restaurant property with a large vacant lot that was next to a retirement development. The building itself probably should be torn down, so I was marketing a location really. Locals had to drive several miles to go food shopping. I was convinced a small grocer should move in and would make it there. There was no grocery store for miles!

Unfortunately, the large chains decided that the demographics would not support their stores. And the smaller local chains I approached were struggling themselves, and not in expansion mode. I couldn’t sell a single grocery store on the idea.
I surveyed the residents of the retirement community and found they wanted a dollar store, a crafts store, and a pharmacy. I tried approaching these kinds of developers and I got a dollar store interested. Unfortunately they didn’t want my lot and built a dollar store next door on a lot another broker had listed! It was a good idea, but didn’t sell my property.

Selling a closed restaurant is not easy, especially with financing these days. Even when you find a buyer, if it’s another entrepreneur who wants to open a restaurant, it’s going to be an uphill battle to get him to the closing table.
If the seller can handle the risk, perhaps the only way for the buyer to take over would be with seller financing — part of the deal or even the whole transaction. That only works if he isn’t so far into debt that that he’s underwater.
It’s certainly a challenge, but many real estate brokers in 2010 and 2011 had better learn how to handle these kinds of properties. There’s going to be more of them coming on the market in the immediate future.