Whataburger NNN Properties for Sale (1 Listing)
1 active listing · Updated October 8, 2026
Whataburger is a private, company-operated burger chain. BDT Capital Partners bought a majority in 2019. The Dobson family kept a minority, and the sponsor is commonly referred to now as BDT & MSD Partners. New net-lease deals are often absolute-net ground leases: you own land, the company owns the restaurant, and the cap rate is tight because the term is long and the brand is hard to pry off a corner.
New Whataburger dirt has been marked from the middle of the 4s into the middle of the 5s. Quick Facts shows the Whataburger mark as market talk, not as a verified average. The rest of the restaurant book is at properties for sale.
Quick Facts
- Typical cap range
- 4.50–5.50%
- Lease type
- Absolute NNN ground lease on many new pads
- Typical term
- Often 15–20 yr on new ground leases
- Credit
- Private — majority sold to BDT in 2019; family kept a minority
- Guarantee
- Whataburger affiliate — confirm; the sponsor does not pay rent
Whataburger Listings
Listing information is deemed reliable but not guaranteed — pricing, cap rates, and lease terms are subject to change, prior sale, or withdrawal without notice.
Get off-market Whataburger deals
Land lease mechanics
A ground lease ends with a building you may not own and a tenant who may have a renewal option you should not count yet. Read surrender, purchase options, and who pays taxes on land versus improvements. Absolute net means the landlord's job is to collect rent only if the lease actually says that. Expansion-market rents are sometimes set to justify construction, not to match a long sales history at that pin on the map.
Private credit with a public-sized reputation
There is no 10-K. There is a beloved brand, a professional sponsor, and unit volumes that are commonly described as strong versus ordinary burger franchisees. Strong is not a guaranty. Get the legal tenant, a parent joinder if one exists, and any sales figure the seller will share. Compare the rent with those sales. A mid-4 cap on a pro forma is a development yield, not a bond.
Burger comps that file or franchise
Chick-fil-A is the other ground-lease burger credit buyers use as the quality benchmark, with its own corporate structure. Taco Bell is mostly large-franchisee paper at a wider cap and with more deal flow. Burger King is the franchise yield. Whataburger is the private company ground lease. It belongs in a 1031 list when the land is good and the term is real. The category page is QSR NNN properties for sale.
Texas core, Georgia expansion
Texas is home. Georgia and Florida are published expansion states. Arizona is linked as a Sunbelt market buyers cross-shop for new burger pads; confirm Whataburger is open in the city you care about. Do not count option decades as term. A 15-year primary term that started last summer is the term.
Whataburger NNN FAQs
Who owns Whataburger?
The Dobson family sold a majority stake to BDT Capital Partners in 2019 and kept a minority. The sponsor is commonly described now as BDT & MSD Partners after those firms combined. Whataburger is private. There is no ticker and no rating to memorize. The lease guarantor should be a Whataburger operating company. BDT is not your tenant.
Why do new Whataburger deals look like ground leases?
On many new pads the company owns the building and you own the land, on an absolute-net ground lease with a long primary term. That is the tight-cap product. Fee-simple deals that include the orange-and-white building are a different asset and should not be priced off the ground-lease quote. Confirm which one the deed and the lease describe.
What cap rates are commonly reported?
Fresh Whataburger ground leases are the tight private-QSR conversation, driven by brand loyalty, company operations, and a land-only Whataburger structure rather than a bond rating. Buyers have been marking new Whataburger dirt from the middle 4s into the middle 5s. Quick Facts holds the Whataburger mark. A short Whataburger franchise exception does not belong in it, and it is not an owner-verified sales study.
Is the brand still mostly Texas?
Texas is the core, and the company has pushed into other Sunbelt states, including Georgia and Florida, with Arizona also in the expansion conversation buyers see. A Villa Rica, Georgia ground lease is an expansion-market land deal, not a 1970s Texas unit with decades of sales at that corner. Ask whether rent was set off trailing volume or off a new-market pro forma.
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