Old City Retail/Residential Building Sells for $12M

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PHILADELPHIA-In the largest of three building sales here, a New Jersey investment group paid $12.3 million for 315 Arch St., the seven-story property at that address that houses the Dane Décor furniture store and 53 apartment units. In an unrelated transaction, Starr Restaurant Organization has acquired the two-story vacant building at 718 Chestnut St., a block on which it currently operates two of its nearly dozen local restaurants. Also unrelated, the former Mattress Giant retail site traded for $1.4 million.

The property at 315 Arch is an historically certified structure aggregating approximately 70,000 sf. The Dane Décor showroom occupies the ground floor and a below-ground level. Michael Barmash, director and SVP of the local office of Colliers Lanard & Axilbund, represented the buyer and the seller, a local investment group.

He tells GlobeSt.com that one of the 53 apartments on floors two through seven has been recently vacated. He says the Old City location, a gentrified neighborhood of galleries, shops and restaurants, was the property's primary appeal in addition to the building itself and its stable tenancy.

Barmash also negotiated the Chestnut St. sale, but declined to disclose the price. The seller is Lanax Corp., a local investor. He says the buyer did not disclose plans for the building. Earlier Barmash negotiated the lease of another property on the same city block for Stephen Starr, local restaurateur and head of the firm that acquired this property. Starr first opened Bleu Angel, a French bistro, in the rented space and then converted it to Angelina, an Italian restaurant, which recently closed. Calls to Starr were not returned by deadline.

Local investment group EAMB Management LLC acquired the 13,200-sf building located on just more than an acre at 9356 Old Bustleton Ave. for just over $106 per sf. Colliers L&A also represented the seller, Stepping Stones Properties LLC. Mattress Giant has vacated its 10,000-sf unit in the building and a fruit and produce merchant continues to occupy 3,200 sf.