Changes are coming to the Congress Street in Portsmouth. Once dotted with empty storefronts, the downtown corridor has filled with upscale retail business and restaurants in recent years.

Now the first floor spaces of the Worth buildings, home to restaurants like Pesce Blue and The Friendly Toast, as well as retail space that includes Somnia and the Portsmouth Health Food Store, are being converted into business condos, allowing tenants to permanently buy their space instead of leasing on a yearly basis. With property values rising, this could spell trouble for some of the longtime residents.

Friendly Toast owner Melissa Jasper recently found out her own space has been appraised at $300 per square foot, giving her restaurant a value of $900,000. At current mortgage rates, this would give Jasper monthly payments of approximately $11,000.

“That’s an insane amount of money for a restaurant,” says Jasper, who’s current lease costs her $5,500 a month. The Friendly Toast has been at 121 Congress St. for 10 years. Jasper has been looking into the possibility of protecting her lease for a 10-year period, which would keep her payments at the current rate.

Scott Nelson, the owner of the Portsmouth Health Food Store, hopes to stay at his current location as well. The Health Food Store, which has been in Portsmouth for 30 years, moved to the corner of Congress Street and Maplewood Avenue in 1992.“There was really nothing down this end of town (when we moved in),” he says. Nelson would like to stay where he is, but is confident his store could survive a change of location. “We’re so established, I think we would succeed anywhere,” he says.

Rumors have been circulating that Jasper has been contemplating moving the Friendly Toast to Dover. Since the Crescent City Bistro closed, some Dover hopefuls have been dreaming of a Friendly Toast in their own town. Jasper laughs off this rumor, and can place its exact genesis.

“I was eating at Crescent City Bistro, and I asked the waitress if it was really for sale. I was just idly curious. The waitress recognized me, though, and asked, ‘Oh, are you going to open a Friendly Toast here?’ I said no, but somehow it became this big rumor.”

Jasper has no plans or desire to move from her current location.

“I’d pay anything to stay,” she said. “I’d hate to risk losing a lot of regular business.”

Building owner Bob Shaines could not be reached for comment by press time.