Transforming Old BuildingsInto High Tech Centers

CHICAGO—Hundreds of commercial real estate professionals gathered yesterday for a conference on re-positioning assets, and did so in a very appropriate space. Instead of one of the usual downtown hotels, Hansen Realty hosted the meeting at its 350,000-square-foot Bradley Business Center, a former manufacturing facility on the Northwest Side that it plans to transform into a high tech office and flex space.

Participants met in the cavernous, nearly vacant building, which a joint venture between Hansen and Centrum Partners bought from Wrightwood Capital LLC for $6.25 million in 2011. The latter bought it for more than $20 million in 2008, but the recession upset their plans.