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The former Northridge Mall, which closed in 2003, is on the sale block after the current owner's plans to redevelop it failed.

The property, with an asking price of $2.75 million, is listed with Milwaukee brokerage Cassidy Turley Barry. With demand for commercial real estate space recovering, the timing is right to list the property for sale, said James T. Barry III, the firm's president.

A wide variety of potential buyers will be sought for the property, Barry said Tuesday.

"We're going to cast as wide a net as we can," he said.

The property encompasses about 900,000 square feet on 46 acres, Barry said. It is north of W. Brown Deer Road, and west of N. 76th St.

Beijing-based Toward Group bought most of the former Northridge property in August 2008 for $6 million. Toward President Wu Li in December 2009 announced plans to convert it into a location for Chinese businesses to sell clothing and other wholesale merchandise, and operate retail outlets.

But that proposal floundered.

Wu said in November that financing issues and delays in obtaining necessary approvals for Chinese companies to do business at Northridge had forced Toward to consider alternative plans. He also said Toward would be looking to sell the property.

Toward was the latest in a series of investors at Northridge since the mall closed.

Earlier plan didn't work

Northridge's previous owner, a Los Angeles group led by investor Michael Mirharooni, marketed the property for back-office operations, health care facilities and distribution centers. But that group, which bought the property in 2005 for $2.5 million, didn't land any tenants.

The former Northridge building that once housed Boston Store is owned by another investor, an affiliate of Tucker Development Corp. Tucker leased a portion of that building to Value City Furniture until it closed in March 2009.

Tucker, of Highland Park, Ill., demolished the former Sears building at Northridge in 2005 and in its place developed a Pick 'n Save supermarket and a Menards home improvement store.

Tucker called the development Granville Station. In 2003, the Common Council and then Mayor John O. Norquist approved spending $5 million to help finance Granville Station. Property taxes from the Pick 'n Save and Menards stores will allow the city to recover $6.7 million, including interest costs, by 2021, according to the Department of City Development.

Meanwhile, the department's plan recommends demolishing what remains of Northridge and replacing it with single-family homes and limited commercial uses.

Last November, at an event sponsored by the Granville-Brown Deer Chamber, an organization of area businesses and community groups toured the empty mall and made suggestions for its redevelopment.

Among the ideas: senior housing, corporate headquarters, charter school, medical facility, community recreation, distribution center and retail uses.

The demise of the mall has contributed to a general decline on the adjacent Brown Deer Road retail strip, including this fall's planned closing of the Wal-Mart store and last year's closing of Lowe's.