The suburban real estate investment market continues to click along, as a New England investment firm has agreed to pay nearly $52 million for the Meadows Corporate Center in Rolling Meadows.
Boston-based Intercontinental Real Estate Corp. and local player Golub & Co. have signed a letter of intent to buy the 546,000-square-foot complex, sources familiar with the transaction said. The complex is 85 percent leased, according to real estate research firm CoStar Group.
An Intercontinental spokeswoman said the company is “pursuing the opportunity,” but the financial terms are not yet firm.
The Government of Singapore Investment Corp. earlier this year put up for sale the property at 2100 and 2550 W. Golf Rd., hiring the Chicago office of real estate firm Cushman & Wakefield Inc.
Aon Center lease: At Aon Center, Wells Real Estate Funds is close to a deal to renew the headquarters lease of real estate firm Jones Lang LaSalle Inc., a key tenant whose lease would expire in February 2006, sources said.
The deal would end Jones Lang’s five-year, stop-and-go search for a new headquarters.
As part of a 10-year agreement, Jones Lang would increase its space 13 percent, to roughly 135,000 square feet, sources said. Last year, the firm paid net rent, not including taxes and operating expenses, of $11.74 a square foot.
Jones Lang will take over leasing of the 2.5 million-square-foot skyscraper at 300 E. Randolph St., though it will split management responsibility with Georgia-based Wells. And Jones Lang is also expected to take over management of about seven Wells-owned properties nationwide, sources said.
But rival real estate firms are now expected to try to wrest away from Jones Lang its management of 190 S. LaSalle St., where Jones Lang recently considered moving and which is facing the loss of a major tenant.
A Wells spokesman declined to comment.
Wacker Drive deal: As expected, an investment fund managed by Kan Am has purchased 333 W. Wacker Drive, said Atlanta-based WestWindCapital Partners, which represented the Munich-based syndicator. The price was $208 million, sources said.
The Chicago office of real estate investment bank Eastdil Realty Co. advised the seller, a venture of Boston-based investment firm Beacon Capital Partners LLC and Chicago developer John Buck Co. Buck Co. will continue to manage the tower.
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Trammel adds 2: Trammel Crow Co. said the suburban brokerage team of John H. Clark and Robert A. Lundin has jumped from Chicago-based U.S. Equities Realty, where the duo has worked since 2002. Clark, 44 and Lundin, 42, will be senior vice presidents in Trammel’s Schaumburg office.
Centrax to 2 Prudential Plaza: Centrax Corp. has signed a lease for almost 15,000 square feet of space in Two Prudential Plaza, after exercising an early termination option of its lease at the nearby Blue Cross and Blue Shield Building, 300 E. Randolph St., said CB Richard Ellis Inc., which represented the Chicago-based employee training firm (this sentence as published has been corrected in this text). Two Prudential Plaza, 180 N. Stetson Ave., is owned by Shorenstein LP.
Downtown home sales: Sales of new homes downtown climbed in the second quarter to 1,454 units, a jump of nearly 46 percent from the same period last year and a 4 percent increase from the first quarter’s strong results, according to the Downtown Chicago Residential Benchmark Report by Appraisal Research Counselors.
Second-quarter sales were boosted by several high-priced projects overlooking Grant Park, as well as by several more moderately priced developments on the Near West Side.
But speculators are also increasing their activity, thereby inflating the real demand and introducing “a level of instability” into the market, the report warns.
And low home mortgage rates are not driving up sales in recently completed projects, “making sellouts difficult to achieve, and impacting the developer’s bottom line,” the report says.
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Downtown housing sales still surging
New-home sales during the second quarter continued to surge, with the highest number of sales since the first quarter of 2001. First-half sales are traditionally strong, and rising interest rates are expected to further dampen sales during the second half of 2004. Meanwhile, the rental market slipped, as interest rates continue to entice apartment dwellers to buy.
%%
2nd qtr 2nd qtr
2003 2004
New-home sales
New construction 658 879
Lofts 65 364
Condo conversions 275 211
Total 998 1,454
Occupancy rate (pct.)
Luxury 93.6 92.9
Standard 92.3 90.3
Effective rents (per sq. ft.)
Luxury $1.88 $1.84
Standard 1.62 1.66
Source: Appraisal Research Counselors
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