Business Activity
- Additional tenants have been announced for the Vakos Companies’ commercial development off Mudd Tavern Road in Thornburg at Interstate 95. Starbucks and Wawa have already opened there, and agreements are in place for an Arby’s, Zaxby’s (the region’s first) and Advance Auto Parts. Flint Development, a commercial real estate developer, has begun site work on a 555,675-square-foot distribution facility on a 36-acre industrial development just north of the Kalahari Resorts & Conventions site and south of the Wawa and Starbucks. Flint purchased the site from a Vakos affiliate in February for $5,250,900, according to land records.
- Dubai Shawarma & Cafe has opened at 2010 Princess Anne St. in Fredericksburg.
- Water & Barley plans to open its downtown bagel shop at 529 Caroline St. on June 24. The business has been a vendor at the Spotsylvania Farmers Market for the past couple of years and now is opening a pop-up store during the day in the building also used for Rehana’s @529 (which offers after-dinner drinks, small plates and desserts). Water & Barley will be open 6 a.m. to 2 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday, and Rehana’s @529 is open weekend evenings.
- AquaPulse IV, which offers IV therapy, opened this past weekend inside the renovated building at 520 William St. in downtown Fredericksburg.
- Fragrance retailer Perfumania recently opened a store next to the Cinnabon shop at the Spotsylvania Towne Centre.
- Alexandria-based Burke & Herbert Bank officially completed its acquisition of LINKBANK this week. LINK customers became Burke & Herbert customers Monday. Burke & Herbert is now the sixth-largest area bank by deposits, according to FDIC data, trailing only Atlantic Union Bank, Truist Bank, Wells Fargo Bank, Bank of America and PNC Bank (in that order).
- Sheetz on Thursday (June 18) will open its new store at 2050 New Post Blvd. in Spotsylvania County. The new store is Sheetz’s eighth Fredericksburg-area location. To celebrate the opening, Sheetz will host a special event beginning at 9 a.m. Thursday outside the store that will feature giveaways including $250 in Sheetz gift cards and other prizes. Free self-serve coffee and soda will also be offered that day. Sheetz will also be donating $2,500 each to the Fredericksburg Regional Food Bank and the Special Olympics of Virginia.
- Luxuria Totalis, a wellness collective offering services such as facials and massage therapy, recently leased a 1,022-square-foot space at 4553 Empire Court in Spotsylvania, according to leasing broker Commonwealth Commercial.
Movers & Shakers
This week’s edition of the Biz Beat Banter podcast features Dr. Maithreyi Sarma, a hematologist and medical oncologist for Mary Washington Healthcare. Among the topics discussed: how AI is affecting medicine, the need for good bedside manners, and how a family illness shaped her career decision.- Coldwell Banker Commercial Elite broker Brian Cunningham has been named to Coldwell Banker Commercial’s “1906 Club” for transaction revenue in 2025. The award recognizes the top 50 Coldwell Banker Commercial brokers nationwide.
- This week on Biz Beat Clips, we wrap up a two-part series taking viewers inside Amazon’s two large Stafford warehouses on Centreport Parkway. This week features the company’s delivery station, which is the end of the journey for many Amazon packages.
- Amazon, which is building numerous data centers in the region, released a report last week showing that the company’s data centers have gotten 52 percent more water-efficient since 2021, and are seven times more water-efficient than the industry average.
Real Estate Review
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This Stafford home sold last week for $1,247,500, topping the list of home sales in the region last week.
There were 100 home sales in the Fredericksburg region last week, including two for more than $1 million, according to this week’s report from the Fredericksburg Area Association of Realtors (FAAR). Check back weekly for the past-week sales.
- Fredericksburg-area median housing prices rose 1 percent year-over-year in May to $492,750, according to FAAR data. That was the highest median price for the region on record. The 558 homes that sold in May spent an average of 26 days on the market before getting a ratified contract. Stafford ($550,000) had the highest median, followed by Spotsylvania ($474,447), King George ($460,000), Fredericksburg ($454,649), Caroline ($444,450), Orange ($420,000) and Colonial Beach ($337,000). Here are locality-by-locality data:
- A request has been submitted to Stafford to rezone a 0.41-acre property on Telegraph Road to allow for a professional office. The property is about 1,000 feet southeast of U.S. 1 and northwest of Barnwell Drive. The request would change the zoning from R-1 (Suburban Residential Zoning District) to B-1 (Convenience Commercial Zoning District).
- FFP report: When it’s completed sometime next year, the two-story community building at Jeremiah Community in Fredericksburg will feature gathering spaces, medical and counseling offices, a pantry/store and a commercial kitchen.
- FFP report: The Spotsylvania Board of Supervisors didn’t host the two data center community meetings that were recently held in the county. But residents showed up to a recent board meeting suggesting the supervisors get more involved in forcing developers to provide transparent and concise information in their presentations to the public.
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Dean Real Estate Holdings LLC recently bought about 11.15 acres in the Carmel Church Business Park at Enterprise Parkway and Rogers Clark Boulevard in Caroline from Grant Massie Land Company for $1,114,442, according to listing broker Cushman & Wakefield | Thalhimer. The land will be used as an industrial storage yard.
Biz Beat Roundup runs every Wednesday and includes a roundup of business news from around the Fredericksburg region. Send submissions to: [email protected]
