RI Commercial Real Estate — Prices Cut, Properties Hit the Market As Businesses Rethink Work

RI Commercial Real Estate — Prices Cut, Properties Hit the Market As Businesses Rethink Work

Multiple downtown Providence office buildings are on the market — some with prices getting slashed.

The properties range from a bit of a flood of office buildings in downtown Providence to the historic Atlantic Mills to, as GoLocal reported Monday, the event venue Venus de Milo in nearby Swansea.

The coronavirus is changing how people work, where they work and the economics of workspace.  

GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLAST

 

In downtown Providence alone there are more than half a dozen office buildings on the market:

 

- 159 Weybosset — a building that housed some of the offices for Alex and Ani is now on the market for $3.895 million

 

- 55 Pine Street that houses the restaurant 10 Streak and Sushi on the first floor and primary law offices on the upper floors is on the market for $2.8 million.

 

- 72 Pine Street an office building closer to the Garrahy Court House is on the market for $3.75 million.

 

- One block down 156-160 Westminster — the office building that houses law offices and a branch of Washington Trust was hit with a price cut —to $2.595 million. 

 

Obviously, downtown Providence is not the only place where commercial real estate is on flux.

 

Another significant property to hit the market is the Atlantic Mill complex in Olneyville. The historic four-story castle-like historic mill was to be the spark to help redevelop the Olneyville neighborhood. Asking price: $4.1 million.

As GoLocal's architecture critic Will Morgan wrote, "Founded as a delaine (worsted) mill in the 1850s, it flourished in the Civil War, and manufacturing here expanded to the big mill you see today. The first half was built in 1863 and the second added in 1882, with some ancillary structures built up until the turn of the twentieth century.

Although the original company folded during the Panic of 1873, the subsequent Atlantic Mills became the largest worsted and cotton mill in the city, employing more than 2,000 people. Some manufacturing of cotton was done here until after World War II. Echoing the decline of the textile industry in New England, these mills are shadows of themselves, hanging on by hosting such various less-than-uptown enterprises, as a used furniture store, warehousing, and the odd business and designer's studio."

And as GoLocal reported on Monday, one of the region's largest event venues -- the Venus di Milo -- is now on the market. Part of the marketing of the property is that it can be demoed for reuse.

"Venus de Milo operated in a 60,000 sq. ft. restaurant and catering facility on a 7-acre waterfront parcel. This site could be a redevelopment of the existing building or a flat, waterfront site for a residential or retail project," states the marketing material for the property that has an asking price of $4.75 million.   

 

Rethinking Workspace Coast-to-Coast

The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday that Facebook Inc. is buying REI's custom-made new headquarters near Seattle for $390 million.  It was to be the outdoor companies dream workspace, but the coronavirus changed that and the company shifted to a work from home model.

"The outdoor clothing and gear retailer, known as REI, had been planning to occupy the 400,000 square foot campus in Bellevue, Wash., this summer. REI designed the elaborate complex to reflect its outdoorsy image, and the company once hoped it would serve as a way to recruit new employees. The property features outdoor staircases and bridges, a courtyard of native plants, and skylights to let in sunshine and air," writes the WSJ. "But REI never occupied it because of the pandemic, opting instead to cash out while employees work remotely from home or a number of smaller offices in the region."

In the short-term work is not the same. The question is what will work look like in the future.