GlobeSt.com UPDATE: Developers Eye Churches for Future Condo Conversion

"There's been a lot of interest," Michael Harkins, with Harkins Real Estate, an Andover, MA-based realty firm and auctioneer, tells GlobeSt.com. Harkins, who is handling four of the properties, St. Peter & Paul Church in Lawrence and Notre Dame de Lourdes, Nuestra Senora del Carmen and Sacred Heart Church, all in Lowell, said he's received multiple offers for the properties but only one, Notre Dame, at 101 Smith St. in Lowell, is currently under agreement. Bids on St. Peter & Paul and Sacred Heart churches are in hand awaiting acceptance by the archdiocese, he says.

While most of the interest has come from developers eager to turn the prime parcels into condominiums, several religious organizations also have expressed interest in purchasing the buildings for worship. "For churches that are looking to acquire a new building, it's a fantastic opportunity," says Jim Belli, with the Codman Co. a Cambridge realtor which is marketing five Boston-area churches. "It's a great deal because the cost to acquire is significantly less than to buy and build a comparable property."

While church groups have shown interest, most of the buildings will likely go to developers, area brokers say. "Buyers see the potential for developing these buildings," says Jim O'Neal, with the Nordblom Co. in Burlington, which is marketing three Gloucester, MA churches and a rectory in Rockport, MA. "They're unusual, they're open and they're in residential neighborhoods."

Michael Price, president of Waltham-based Eastport Real Estate Services, which reached an agreement with the archdiocese earlier this month to purchase St. Joseph's Church at 159 Main St. in Waltham, says he hopes to sell the church to a local religious group and turn the adjacent rectory into a single family residence in order to preserve the streetscape. The property, which is expected to close in June, also contains a parking lot, a smaller home and a child care center. Plans for those buildings have not yet been developed.

The Waltham property was one of several churches recently placed under agreement by the Boston Archdiocese, which is planning to sell off more than 65 church properties in total during the next few years. Condominium developers have grabbed the bulk of the properties already placed under agreement.

The Planning Office for Urban Affairs Inc. a non-profit housing developer affiliated with the archdiocese will purchase St. Joseph's Church in Salem, while St. James Church in Medford will be bought by Woburn-based Northshore Construction & Development, which expects to turn the property into condominiums. Those properties are expected to close in June. In 2003, a South Boston developer paid $2.4 million for St. Peter and Paul's Church in South Boston, a 155-year-old granite structure that was turned into 36 luxury condominiums with a price tags of up to $1.3 million.