Price tag on downtown St. Pete's First Central Tower: $29M
By Ashley Gurbal Kritzer
Tampa Bay Business Journal
Published: Nov 26, 2014

The group of investors looking to reinvent First Central Tower in downtown St. Petersburg paid $29.15 million for the property, according to Pinellas County records.

The Tampa Bay Business Journal was first to report that a joint venture of Feldman Equities, Tower Realty Partners and Second City Real Estate had acquired the 17-story, 250,000-square-foot tower at 360 Central Ave. for an undisclosed price. The partners are planning $10 million in renovations, including collaborative lounges for tenants, which they hope will lure CEOs who want to attract a Millennial workforce.

The price breaks down to about $116 per square foot. That price is low for an office tower in the Bay area, but it makes sense, given that the property hasn't been updated in years and will soon be 50 percent vacant.

The seller, Michigan-based Osprey Real Estate, paid $17.45 million for the tower in 2001, according to property records. Larry Feldman, whose Feldman Equities is part of the joint venture, has a track record of buying struggling Bay area office towers and turning them around. The Wells Fargo Center in downtown Tampa, which he acquired in late 2012 and then renovated, is on the market. Feldman also owns the Morgan Stanley Tower and City Center in downtown St. Petersburg.

Within two years of the purchase and redevelopment of each office building, the group has increased the occupancy rate in the Morgan Stanley Tower from 65 percent to 96 percent; City Center from 44 percent to more than 94 percent. The Wells Fargo Center has gone from 75 percent to 93 percent.

The same group also took Fountain Square II, an office building on Independence Parkway, from 69 percent to 99 percent occupancy and sold it for nearly $25 million earlier this year.

Ashley Gurbal Kritzer is a reporter for the Tampa Bay Business Journal.