The investment pair closed on the Fan Pier purchase late Thursday, ending the property's nearly three decades of ownership by the Pritzker family, who also own the Hyatt hotel chain. "This is great news for the city to have a vacant piece of the waterfront developed," Gilbert Dailey, senior director with Cushman & Wakefield's Boston office tells GlobeSt.com. "And its great to have these two strong groups develop a piece of what will be part of the future of Boston."

Fallon, a partner in the new Westin hotel being built at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center in South Boston, has said he expects to begin construction on a residential building with a hotel component by next summer. Joseph F. Fallon, president of the Fallon Co. says the partnership will "turn Fan Pier into a development that will benefit Bostonians in the immediate future and for generations to come." Under a plan already approved by the city, the site will contain a public marina, large park, and waterfront green space along with offices, residential units and retail. The total project has a cost of approximately $1.2 billion.

The land, which is permitted for about three million sf of mixed use development, has been the focus of much wrangling in recent years between the Pritzkers and the city, which considers the 21 acres to be key to the development of Boston's Seaport District.Two $125-million offers on the land from Florida home builder Lennar Corp. and shopping mall developer Stephen Karp were never finalized. Mayor Thomas Menino begin pressuring the Pritzkers earlier this summer to sell or develop the site after those deals fell through. City councilors threatened to take the land by eminent domain if its sale wasn't finalized soon.