Starwood to Sell $1.2 Billion Worth of Dead Malls

The smartest guys in the room are selling some their shopping mall portfolio. Is this the bottom or a sign of worse things to come?

Starwood Capital Group LLC hired Eastdil Secured LLC to broker the sale of U.S. malls valued at about $1.2 billion, according to two people with knowledge of the matter.

Starwood is selling malls it had acquired from Westfield Corp. including assets in Chicago, San Francisco and Cleveland, the people said, asking not to be identified as the sales process is private. Starwood and Eastdil declined to comment.

Interestingly, just two years ago they bought 7 malls from Taubman for $1.4 billion.