Regions, the bank that held the mortgage to the partially developed Halls Ferry Station strip mall, now holds the deed, buying the property for $2.65 million at a foreclosure sale Monday.

In turn, bank officials said, they will immediately seek new investors for the 30,000 square-foot property between The Home Depot and Walgreens.

There was one competing bid of $1 million by A.G. Helton of Yazoo-City based Action Properties.

Construction started on the site in 2005, but financing problems halted development of the site in 2006 as it passed from Ergon Properties to Frazier Development LLC, then to foreclosure.

Halls Ferry Station sits on the site of the former Halls Ferry Elementary School, which was razed in 2002. It is near the city’s busiest intersection, where other development continues. Regions, formerly AmSouth, operates one of its three local branches just yards from the vacant development.

In 2004, Walgreens was built on the site as part of Ergon’s development there, following construction of The Home Depot. Values on the land on which Walgreens sits reached $1.06 million in 2007, while The Home Depot has been valued at $5.3 million.

The City of Vicksburg owns much of the area now operated as Halls Ferry Park, a complex of ball fields and tennis courts that the city intends to transfer to the private Aquila Group for redevelopment into a $40 million recreation complex.

Other retail development on the way near the site includes the $25 million Cypress Centre Marketplace, for which the first plat was approved by city officials in September. Wingate Hotel is part of the development there, with its completion date delayed into next year.

Another nearby adjacent 1.7 acres of land was sold by Ergon Properties this month to Premier Hospitality Group. Company officials said in February the tract was marketed with an eye toward restaurant and retail development.