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As Chicago barrels headfirst into summer, more downtown office buildings are being put up for sale. The latest asset on the market is 225 West Wacker, Crain's Chicago Business reports. The news comes a couple of days after Beacon Capital agreed to sell 300 South Wacker to Golub for $155M.
JLL is courting buyers for the 31-story building on behalf of Mirae Asset Global Investments, a Korean investor that bought the building for $218M in 2013. Bids are expected to reach as high as $235M, marking an 8% return.
Mirae was one of several foreign investors that entered the downtown office market in recent years, enticed by strong rent spreads and occupancy rates, and undeterred by news reports of rampant violence in Chicago's outer neighborhoods.
225 West Wacker is hitting the market amid some tenant movement. The building's vacancy rate stands at 11%, a slight drop from when Mirae bought the property. Merrill Lynch is expected to vacate 67K SF when its parent company, Bank of America, moves some of its downtown operations to 110 North Wacker. But there are tenants moving into the building. Cushman & Wakefield signed an 83K SF lease last fall, and PPM America expanded its footprint to 100K SF.
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