Chicago owner of liquor store chain buys vacant Sterling building near Northland Mall

STERLING – The owners of Liquor 'N' Wine, which has a location on Galena Avenue in Dixon, bought the former Advanced Auto Parts building near Northland Mall, Whiteside County property records show.

Elixir Real Estate, based in suburban West Chicago, bought the 6,500-square-foot property at 2930 E. Lincolnway for $1.2 million from AVC Watkins Portfolio, previously Watkins Sterling LLC.

Liquor 'N' Wine, owned by Manish Patel of Chicago, also has locations in Rochelle, Genoa, Geneva, St. Charles and Arlington Heights.

The space was owned by the mall for four decades, and once was the site of a J.C. Penney auto shop. It sat vacant for nearly 20 years after Ken Nelson relocated its auto dealership elsewhere in town in the mid-1990s. It was a Tires Plus store before razed in 2013.

Advanced Auto Parts movedinto a brand-new buiding in 2013, then closed in October 2015. It sat empty since.