"Over the course of the two-and-a-half years we owned it, we were able to take it from 60% to 100% occupied," says Barry Missner, president and CEO of the firm. "There are some strong credit tenants in there now with long-term leases. We felt with the cycle of our ownership it was appropriate to sell."

The building is occupied by 12 tenants, the largest of which are the DuPage Work Force Board, which is housed in 17,000 square feet, and the College of DuPage, which fills 8,000 square feet. Other tenants' occupy about 5,000 square feet on average. Asking lease rates in the building are around $21 per square foot, gross, and the remaining terms of the current tenants' leases range from seven to 10 years.

"Kevin Travers, the president of Midwest Realty Advisors, spearheaded the purchase," Missner says. "They typically purchase suburban office buildings in this mid-size size range, with higher lease occupancies. It fell within some of the investment parameters they like to pursue."

Making the purchase even more appealing was the assumable financing for the property, he says. "We were able to sell it with the existing financing in place, and figured it was easier for someone to buy it and assume a loan than buy and source a new loan," Missner says. "Had it not been financed, we probably would not have tried to sell it, because the financing would not result in a purchase price that would motivate us to sell. The fact that financing was in place was a key driver for us to sell the property, and Midwest was able to assume financing with nine years left on it."

The property is in the Interstate 88 corridor, where vacancies have been on the increase, Missner says. "This building is outperforming the submarket," Missner says. "The market has some fairly high vacancy rates, but these are strong, longer-term tenants, so Travers might be somewhat immune to the downturn in the market. He won't come to the market with a lot of vacancy when that market is soft, and I'm sure they looked at that as one of the issues in terms of willingness to buy the property."