Brookfield’s fire sale of its D.C.-area office properties continues.

The Canadian investment giant has sold a trio of 1980s-era office properties across from the Silver Spring Metro station totaling more than 700K SF for $35M, according to Maryland property records.

New York-based Ascendra Capital and New Jersey-based Blue Management Services acquired Silver Spring Metro Plaza for less than $50 per SF.

Ascendra Chief Investment Officer David Steinberg announced the acquisition on LinkedIn last month, commenting that it was a "lender-controlled sale." He also said it represents the partnership's second Silver Spring buy, after it purchased 8455 Colesville Road. That sale has also not been previously reported.

Brookfield declined to comment on the transaction, and the buyers didn't immediately respond to Bisnow's requests for comment.

Brookfield Properties acquired Silver Spring Metro Plaza in 2006 through its acquisition of $7.9B in assets from Trizec Properties, a deal it executed through a joint venture with Blackstone. The most recent loan recorded was a $110M refinancing in 2020 from German lender Helaba.

The new owners retained CBRE to market the property. Vice President Tim Connolly, who is part of that marketing team, along with Senior Vice Presidents Niel Beggy and Brian McCarthy, told Bisnow there is 275K SF available across the roughly 730K SF property at 8401, 8403 and 8405 Colesville Road.

Silver Branch Brewing Co.'s Lagerhaus and Biergarten occupies the ground floor of one of the office towers, which are connected through a series of skybridges.

The sale closed on July 9, deed records show, and the buyers received a $22M loan from Symetra Life Insurance Co.

It is the latest disposition from a company that has been steadily offloading assets for significantly reduced values in and around the nation's capital in the years following the pandemic.

In 2019, Brookfield had more than 2M SF across 32 D.C. office properties. It had just 20 such properties as of late June, Bisnow reported.

The company had more than 100 people at its downtown D.C. office three years ago, and it had fewer than 10 at the office as of June, Bisnow reported at the time.

Last month, Brookfield sold a 591K SF Tysons office building to a Clark Construction affiliate for $64M, the Washington Business Journal reported.

That followed its disposal of a 388K SF office building on top of the Bethesda Metro station in May, when Florida-based In-Rel Properties picked up the leasehold interest in 3 Bethesda Metro Center for $20M. That price was 87% less than what Brookfield paid in 2011. 

Last fall, Brookfield lost six Montgomery County office buildings to a foreclosure auction, with five going back to the lender. The year before, it lost a vacant 383K SF office property in downtown D.C. to its lender, Starwood Property Trust, through a foreclosure auction. Starwood is now converting that building into 270 residences.

While it has dramatically scaled back its D.C. holdings, Brookfield has ramped up its CRE acquisition activity this year, partnering with the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board to acquire LXP Industrial Trust for $5.2B, forming a $2.1B medical office joint venture with Healthpeak Properties and buying industrial outdoor storage company Peakstone Realty Trust for $1.2B.