Boise’s old Sears store may soon be demolished. A surprising project would replace it
Boise may soon say goodbye to the former Sears store at the Towne Square mall.
A developer wants to tear it down to make room for new apartments that could fulfill every ’80s kid’s fantasy of never leaving the mall.
On Monday, Seritage Growth Properties applied for a permit to demolish the building and construct 256 apartments at the 460 N. Milwaukee St. site. The 120,800-square-foot Sears building has been vacant since 2019.
Seritage, a spinoff of Sears Holdings, took ownership of the Sears building in January 2020, after the store closed. This April it sold the property, which is owned separately from the rest of the mall, to Madison Capital Group, a North Carolina developer.
The application says the project would consist of four buildings. Three would be four-story apartments, two of them covering 100,000 square feet each and one covering 88,000 square feet. The fourth building would be a 12,000-square-foot clubhouse.
The apartments would include 126 one-bedroom units, 91 two-bedrooms and 34 three-bedrooms. The complex would have 332 vehicle parking spaces and 34 bike parking spaces.
Unlike most of the leased stores, the 8.3-acre Sears property is owned separately from the rest of the mall.
“Madison has been purchasing empty retail boxes for a variety of uses that include self-storage conversions and the redevelopment to a multifamily and retail use,” said a Madison Capital Group news release announcing the Boise purchase and one in Georgia.
“The two recent acquisitions are located adjacent to active malls, the Boise Towne Square in Boise, ID, and the Oglethorpe Mall in Savannah, GA. The Charlotte-based development company has plans to redevelop each box into a mixed-use development that could include residential housing and retail.”
It’s unclear why Seritage applied after Madison Capital Group bought the building. Local architecture firm CSHQA submitted the application.
Seritage, Madison Capital Group, Boise Towne Square administrators and CSHQA representatives did not immediately return requests for comment.
Demolition would mark the epilogue to the story of Sears in Boise.
Sears began as a mail-order catalog business in the 1880s and has a long history in Idaho. First registering with the Secretary of State’s Office in 1928, it operated a store at the time in the Alexander Building at 9th and Main streets. By 1930, it was operating a block north, at 9th and Idaho Street.
Longtime Treasure Valley residents remember Sears at 1215 W. State St. where the Idaho State Insurance Fund now operates. It stood there for decades before the Boise Towne Square store opened in 1988. Sears was one of the mall’s first anchor tenants.
The apartments wouldn’t be the first housing project to go up in the area:
▪ A Boise developer has plans to build 71 micro-apartments with 340 square feet to 412 square feet each on land bordering Boise Towne Square, the Statesman reported in May.
▪ The Cole Road Apartments would be located at 709 N. Cole Road, across from Candlewood Suites.
▪ South of that property and across Cole, developers are planning a five-story, 136-unit apartment building at the corner of Cole Road and Denton Street. RGJ Cole Rd., Kai Pacific and South Beck and Baird have applied to build it.
Sally Krutzig covers Treasure Valley growth and development. Have a story suggestion or a question? Email Krutzig at skrutzig@idahostatesman.com.
This story was originally published July 28, 2021 at 4:00 AM.
