ST. PAUL, MN-The Amherst H. Wilder Foundation, a popular local non-profit, is trying to sell its former 13-acre headquarters location. The company moved to a new 100,000-square-foot office building in 2008, and now believes its old site is better suited for apartments.

The company had operated out of a 55,000-square-foot office at 919 Lafond Ave. that was built during the 1920s. However, after the firm paid for a new 100,000-square-foot building and moved in, it decided to demolish the office to help sell the property, says Joe Hughes with CB Richard Ellis. His office is marketing the property for $5.4 million.

Hughes tells GlobeSt.com that multifamily is the best use for the property, and the site has the required zoning. “It’s right in the middle of a residential neighborhood, it’s odd they had their corporate headquarters there. Apartments or even a senior housing development would be most ideal for the site,” he says.

The Minneapolis/St. Paul market is undergoing a stunning year for multifamily. The current vacancy rate is at 3.7%, about half what the rate was in first quarter 2010, Hughes says. “There is a lot of multifamily construction and conversion going on in the market,” he says.

The site is between St. Paul’s Midway and Como Park neighborhoods, and is about five blocks north of University Avenue. The owners have the new building about a mile away on the corner of Lexington and University Avenue. In September, the Wilder Foundation agreed to lease 17,000 square feet of its new digs to Fairview Health Services for office space.