Prime Real Estate opens downtown

Murphy Group LLC, doing business as Prime Real Estate Group, has launched a full-service real estate brokerage firm in downtown Spokane.

Owner and Realtor Melissa Murphy says the office opened in March at 417 W. First.

She has left a partnership in a separate business, Choice Realty LLC, which she co-founded last August with Realtor Ron McIntire. Choice Realty had developed alternative payment structures for marketing and selling real estate.

Murphy says she decided to leave Choice Realty and form Prime Real Estate Group as designated broker because of what she saw as a need in the market for a high level of customer service. She adds that her new agency will offer an alternative payment structure in addition to traditional commission-based payments, but that an hourly-consultation fee option isn't part of those offerings, as it was in the Choice venture.

"I offer consultation options that are unique to my own brokerage," she says. "It's more on a case-by-case basis but without an hourly consulting rate option. It's on a fee-for-performance structure."

In addition to Murphy, Prime Real Estate has three real estate agents and four support-staff employees working in about 2,200 square feet of space.

When representing sellers, Murphy says the new firm offers complimentary property staging consultations and a pre-inspection service. She says the office will add a property management service soon for the rental of higher-end homes. She also expects that the business will expand into Idaho by May.

—Treva Lind

Longtime friends start nutrition store

Spokane residents Mike Valente and Jim Heggenstaller plan to open a vitamin and supplement store, Sound Body Supplements & Sports Nutrition, later this month in leased space at the Five Mile Shopping Center, at 1902 W. Francis, on Spokane's North Side.

The business will focus on workout-support sports nutrition products, Valente says. The store manager, Don Goldsworthy, has five years of experience in sports nutrition, he says.

The 850-square-foot location formerly was a beauty salon that had been in business since 1968. Initial renovations to the space will cost $15,000.

Valente has been a Spokane chiropractor for 16 years and will continue operating Valente Chiropractic at 3017 E. Francis. Heggenstaller is the owner of two Blu Berry Frozen Yogurt shops, in Spokane. The two have been friends since playing football together at Spokane Falls Community College in 1983.

The business will employ five people, and the goal is to open two or three more stores in the Northwest in the next four or five years.

—Audrey Danals

Indian restaurant planned in Valley

Pargat and Manjinder Kahlon, of Spokane, plan to open an Indian restaurant and lounge, named Swagat Indian Cuisine, in a leased 5,900-square-foot space in the Eagle Plaza, at 14415 E. Sprague, says their son, Gurpreet Singh, who has done much of the planning for the establishment.

Singh, a 16-year-old high school sophomore, says the establishment is expected to open Monday, May 14, and probably will employ three in addition to the three family members.

The space was previously a Staggering Ox sandwich shop and will require some remodeling, says, Singh. The kitchen equipment will all be new, including a special Tandoor oven, which is a clay oven used to make Indian food, like naan bread, a slightly leavened bread in a large flat leaf shape, and the oven alone will cost $3,000, he says.

Swagat, the name of the restaurant, means "welcome" in Punjabi, Singh says.

The restaurant's menu will include a range of Indian appetizers, soups, and salads, and Tandoori breads and specialty dishes, plus rice, chicken curry, lamb curry, and vegetarian specialties, as well as side orders and desserts.

Singh says that his parents have always wanted to open a restaurant, and his father has worked and managed in the industry for many years in California.

Singh will work part time in the restaurant he has helped start. He negotiated the paperwork, which is very extensive, he says, and did all of the calling. His parents speak limited English, so he was integral to the process.

Pete Thompson, of Stonemark Real Estate Co., represented the Kahlons in the lease transaction, and Earl Engle and Mike King, both of Black Commercial Inc., represented the property owners.

—Audrey Danals

Rusty Roof's to take Ionic Burritos space

Frank and Shanna Haney, of Spokane, have bought the assets of a popular burrito restaurant near Gonzaga University and plan to open in that space a second outlet of a restaurant they own named Rusty Roof's Burger & Shake Shack.

Frank Haney says he and his wife purchased the assets of Ionic Burritos Inc. earlier this spring from former owner Melissa Bozarth. Haney says Bozarth had been looking to sell the business, which now is closed, so that she could focus on another eatery she owns in Spangle, Wash., called The Harvester Restaurant.

He declines to disclose the terms of the transaction.

The Haneys have operated their Rusty Roof's burger-and-shake business at 101 E. Hastings since the fall of 2010. Frank Haney says that he and his wife had intended to expand their business to other Spokane neighborhoods and felt the timing was right when they heard Bozarth was looking to sell her restaurant.

Located in a roughly 2,400-square-foot leased space at 1415 N. Hamilton, the former Ionic Burrito space currently is undergoing some remodeling work, and Haney says he hopes to have the Rusty Roof restaurant open there within the next month.

He says some of Ionic's former employees were retained, and he plans to hire between seven and 10 additional employees.

—Chey Scott