An investor group is looking to take Macy's private with a $5.8 billion bid, a move that would position the new owners to monetize the iconic retailer's real estate portfolio that one analyst values at $6 billion.

Arkhouse Management and Brigade Capital Management, both based in New York, offered to acquire Macy's on Dec. 1, The Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday. Macy's and Arkhouse declined to comment when contacted by CoStar News, and Brigade didn't immediately respond to an email. Several media outlets reported that the offer was for $21 a share, a double-digit increase over the stock's closing price of $17.39 on Friday.

"Years of chronic under-performance has put downward pressure on Macy’s share price and means that the iconic department-store chain is now a relatively attractive prospect," Neil Saunders, a managing director and retail analyst at GlobalData, said in a note on Sunday. "This is one of the reasons investor group Arkhouse Management has submitted a bid to take the company private at a 32% premium over the current share price."

Macy's management must make a judgment call now, according to Saunders.

"Either they show confidence in their future plans and keep Macy’s as a public company, or they let Macy’s go private in a transaction that will likely see the brand fade further and faster," he said. "However, because the long-term trajectory for Macy’s is challenging and because some of the difficult decisions around the business have been put off for far too long, Macy’s management have essentially painted themselves into a tight corner."

Macy's declined to respond to Saunders' remarks.

Arkhouse, a real estate investment firm, and Brigade, a global asset manager, already own a stake in Macy's through funds managed by Arkhouse, the Journal reported.

New York-based Macy's owns its namesake department-store chain, with about 500 stores. It also owns Bloomingdale's, with 37 stores and Bluemercury, with 158 locations. The retailer has been attempting a turnaround after several bumpy years. Its retail sector, department stores, has faced increasingly fierce competition from e-commerce, discounters such as Target and growing off-price chains such as T.J. Maxx and Marshalls. Department stores such as Lord & Taylor were forced to liquidate, and J.C. Penney filed for bankruptcy protection and then was acquired.

Under CEO Jeffrey Gennette, Macy's undertook a massive repositioning of its banner store fleet, a project called "Polaris," which saw it close dozens of mall anchor stores, open its off-price or bargain, Macy's Backstage in-store locations and begin rolling out small-format versions of its brick-and-mortar locations — outside of malls — in order to get closer to customers and more cost-efficiently penetrate deeper into markets. But the results have been mixed financially.

Arkhouse is interested in Macy's real estate, according to Saunders.

"It is important to understand what Arkhouse sees as attractive," he said. "In our view, it is not the retail operation itself. Macy’s struggles with the fundamentals of retailing and its recent sales performance underlines that it continues to lose market share and relevance in an increasingly competitive market. Correcting years of missteps will be expensive and risky for anyone acquiring the business at a premium. Where Arkhouse likely sees value is in Macy’s real estate."

Since Macy’s "still owns many of its own stores, including some flagship locations, its real estate portfolio is worth at least $6 billion at a conservative estimate," according to Saunders.

"That’s more than Macy’s current market capitalization, which means that any savvy investor could snag Macy’s for a bargain and make a generous return by monetizing the real estate alone," he said. "For a real estate-focused business such as Arkhouse, this is a bet worth taking."

But it wouldn't "bode well for the future of Macy’s," according to Saunders.

Macy's owns its Manhattan flagship at 151 W. 34th St., a 2.1 million-square-foot landmark property in Herald Square, according to CoStar data.

"As critical as we are of Macy’s current management, they are at least focused on trying to run the business as a retailer," he said. "An investor group that sells off real estate and perhaps takes other actions such as spinning off the e-commerce business, would certainly make some short-term gains. But unless some of those profits were reinvested in revitalizing the core retail business, it would leave Macy’s in the worst of all worlds. Macy’s would lose its safety net of solid assets and the low store costs that accrue from the ownership of shops."

In 2015 Starboard Value acquired a stake in Macy's and sought for the retailer to spin off its real-estate assets, including its Herald Square location. And in 2012 New York-based hedge fund Jana Partners wanted Macy's to spin off its e-commerce operations.

The Arkhouse-Brigade bid comes shortly before Macy's gets a new leader. Gennette is leaving the company in February and is set to be succeeded by Tony Spring, chairman and CEO of the luxury chain Bloomingdale’s, who was appointed Macy’s president and CEO-elect.

In the third quarter, Macy's posted net sales of $5 billion, down 7% from the third quarter last year. Comparable sales decreased 7% on an owned basis and down 6.3% on an owned-plus-licensed basis. Owned refers to Macy's private brands and other market brands it owns, while owned-plus-licensed includes sales for lines such as Sunglass Hut and Pandora.