American Way Sleep Inn Sells for $1.2 Million

     Feenas of Memphis Inc. has purchased Sleep Inn at 5119 American Way from Shree Shiv Shankar Enterprises LLC for $1.2 million. The two-story, 50-unit hotel was built in 1998 and totals 20,034 square feet. It sits on 1.63 acres on the south side of American Way east of Clearbrook Street. Feenas of Memphis financed the purchase with a $1 million loan through First Capital Bank. The Shelby County Assessor's 2006 appraisal of the hotel property was $1.4 million.

July Home Sales Up, MAAR Numbers Show

     Area home sales increased 10.2 percent in July over the same time last year, from 1,574 in 2005 to 1,734 last month, according to the most recent statistics from the Memphis Area Association of Realtors' (MAAR) Multiple Listing Service (MLS).
     Monthly sales volume also saw a big jump, increasing 10.9 percent from $280.3 million last July to $310.9 million last month.
     The median home sales price for 2006 changed by less than 3 percent, with July '06 at $146,400 and July '05 at $143,000. Average sales price increased only 1 percent from $178,100 in '05 to $179,300 in '06.
     Year-to-date sales volume was up 17.6 percent at $2 billion compared to $1.7 billion last year.
     Right now, 10,807 active listings are reflected by the MLS figures.

Monsanto Grows Business With D&PL Acquisition

     St. Louis-based agribusiness giant Monsanto Co. has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Delta and Pine Land Co. (D&PL) for $1.5 billion in cash, the companies announced in a joint statement.
     D&PL, which operates the largest and longest-running private cotton seed-breeding program in the world, is headquartered in Scott, Miss., south of Clarksdale and north of Greenville.
     "Our companies are a natural fit that will provide a complete platform of cutting-edge seed technologies to our global farmer customer base for years to come," D&PL president and CEO Tom Jagodinski said in a statement.
     The transaction was approved by the boards of directors of both companies, but still is subject to D&PL shareowner approval, antitrust clearance and customary closing conditions, as well as review and approval by the U.S. Department of Justice.

Park Alliance Changes Name, Elects New Board, Restructures

     The Shelby Farms Park Alliance - formerly known as the Friends of Shelby Farms Park - has restructured its organization and elected a new board of directors, spanning the top talent of many local businesses and civic organizations.
     The board includes executive director Laura Adams and chair Calvin Anderson, who's a vice president of corporate affairs at BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee.
     Other board members include Elizabeth Boyd, a retired senior vice president for First Tennessee Bank, and Stephanie Butler, senior program officer at the Hyde Family Foundations. Dorothy Crook is the executive director of the local chapter of AFSCME, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees.
     Other board members are Larry Jensen, president and CEO of Commercial Advisors LLC; Will Moore, a certified financial planner with the Atkins Group of Morgan Stanley; B. Lee Mallory, president of The Mallory Group, a distribution warehouse firm; Charlie Newman, an attorney with the law firm of Burch, Porter & Johnson PLLC; Ken Reeves, business enterprise manager at International Paper Co.; Frank Ricks, principal at Looney Ricks Kiss Architects; Tom Schmitt, president and CEO of FedEx Global Supply Chain Services; Carol Ross-Spang, who is responsible for human resources and organizational development at Methodist Healthcare; Luke Yancy IV, relationship manager at SunTrust Bank; Pete Wehry, president of Medtronic Sofamor Danek; and Bill Tuttle, vice president of planning in the Memphis market for Baptist Memorial Healthcare.