A deal filed in the major Florida Gulf-side market continues one current station trading trend and bucks another. It becomes yet another sale of a low power television facility, continuing a recent trend. One the other hand, it is going from a non-profit entity to a commercial operator, bucking a recent trend.
The station is WSPF-CA St. Petersburg. Not only is St. Petersburg the city of license, it’s also the licensee.
The buyer is using licensee name WSPF-CA Station LLC, and it’s a subsidiary of Prime Time Partners LLC. Jose Rodriguez and Marisol Messir are among the principals with a stake in Prime Time.
The price for the Channel 35 facility will be $500K.
This marks the third major-leagued-sized east coast LPTV market for primetime. It owns WMBQ-CA New York and has a deal in place to acquire WFXZ-CD Boston.
The WFXZ deal was filed with the FCC 12/14/11. Prime Time is getting it from Boston Broadcasting Corporation for $2.9M.
WMBQ came in a $5.6M deal filed 7/26/11. The seller was Renard Broadcasting Corporation.
Additionally, principals of the buyer have interest in KBEH-TV Oxnard CA, KMOH-TV Kingman AZ and KEJR-LD Phoenix AZ.
