E-Malt.com News article: USA: Three Brewery Blocks for sale, if price is right

Brewery Block 4Portland-Gerding Edlen Development is looking to sell three of five blocks here that it redeveloped on the northwest edge of the Downtown core, immediately north and west of Powell's Books at 10th Avenue and West Burnside St., West News reported May 7. The locally based developer says it spent $166 million on the three blocks over the past several years. Local industry sources tell GlobeSt.com the combined sale price could top $250 million.

One of the blocks for sale, Block 4, holds a 10-story, 270,000-sf building with 234,000 sf of class A office space and 36,000 sf of street-level retail. The building is 100% leased. Office tenants include Art Institute of Portland (84,000 sf), M Financial (57,000 sf), PPM Energy (49,000 sf), and the Army Corps of Engineers (33,500 sf). Retail tenants include Anthropologie (10,300 sf) and PF Chang’s China Bistro (6,200 sf) .

Another block, Block 5, holds a 16-story, 282,000-sf building containing 242 apartment units above 34,000 sf of street-level retail and three levels of underground parking. The multifamily component is close to fully leased. Retail tenants include Lululemon, the North Face, Washington Mutual and West Elm.


The third block, Block 1, holds a four-story, 158,000-sf building that houses a 50,395-sf Whole Foods Market on the ground floor, and Tyco Telecom and Portland Energy Systems on the upper floors. Portland Energy Systems operates an energy-efficient cooling system on the roof of the building that provides air conditioning for all of the buildings in the Brewery Blocks and other Downtown properties.

Each of the buildings has achieved LEED certification from the US Green Building Council. The sale also includes a sizable portion of the 1,500-slip subterranean parking garage. The disposition assignment is in the hands of Chris Johnson, an executive with Norris Beggs & Simpson, a long-time local brokerage firm. Johnson was unavailable for comment.

Local brokers tell GlobeSt.com the office building could fetch upward of $325 per sf given recent comparables and that the apartment building could fetch $350,000 per unit. Rents for the office building are in the $30s per sf and all leases have built in rental increases. The apartment building commands upward of $2 per sf, some of the highest rents in the city. The other building is somewhat harder to value due to the grocery store anchor and the telecom space above, say local brokers.

Gerding Edlen principal Mark Edlen wouldn’t discuss what he thought the portfolio was worth. He also said there’s no need to sell if they aren’t impressed with the offers. “We have a great long-term (assumable) loan on the properties,” he says. “We’ll have to wait to see what the market says.”

The three blocks of property are part of a five-block area known as the Brewery Blocks that Gerding Edlen acquired in 1999. One of the two blocks not part of the offering now holds a 10-story, 248,000-sf class A building with ground-floor retail and three levels of underground parking that is owned by Multi-Employer Property Trust. The other block now holds a 15-story, 270,000-sf mixed-use building housing 123 condominiums above street-level retail and three levels of parking.


08 May, 2007