The owner of Willow Grove Park Mall (and others in the region), has an interesting idea to buck up the retail location’s finances: apartments. Bob Fernandez listed the thinking behind the plan in The Philadelphia Inquirer.

PREIT has, like its counterparts nationwide, been suffering in this harsh landscape of post-COVID shopping climate. The malls are in debt.

Enter CEO Joseph F. Coradino with an idea of keeping the real estate but converting the space to apartments.

“I used to be in the mall business, and now I’m in the real estate business,” he said.

He’s considering 5,200 apartments on six mall sites, to be exact, looking at this plan as a way to raise cash and bring shoppers and diners onsite.

PREIT has proposed an 11-story apartment complex for Montgomery County’s Plymouth Meeting Mall, which sits adjacent to roads that carry 92 million vehicles a year.

The strategy is like other mall owners who are converting former department stores and food courts into health-care facilities, hotels, entertainment centers, gyms, and apartments.

PREIT has numerous hurdles to jump, like navigating townships meeting, zoning hearing, and its $2.3 billion in debt, much of it mortgages on mall properties in the area.

“We like what we own right now. We have a impressive portfolio,” Coradino maintained.

Read more about the possible conversion of PREIT malls to apartments at The Philadelphia Inquirer.