Buyer Pays $10 Million for Landmark Seattle Office Building

A little-known investor picked up an historic office building in Seattle’s Pioneer Square for $9.5 million — $27.5 million less than it traded for six years ago.

A limited liability company led by Jay Bhullar bought the 144,000-square-foot Colman Building at 811 First Avenue, the Puget Sound Business Journal reported.

The seller in the receiver sale was locally based Unico Properties. The sale — reported two weeks ago without a price — works out to $66 per square foot.

Unico bought the six-story, 136-year-old landmark building in 2019 for $37 million, or $257 per square foot. Five years ago, the property was assessed at $37.9 million. The most recent sale represents a 74 percent discount from its previous transaction price.

Little is known about the new owner, also known as Jakkaran Singh Bhullar, head of Coleman 811 1st Ave LLC, according to the Business Journal.

Brokers Darren Tappen, Andy Miller, Pete Beauchamp and Nathan Thinnes of Kidder Mathews represented the court-appointed receiver, John Rothschild of Newmark, in the sale. Kidder Mathews said Bhullar plans to rent out the empty ground-level shops and offices above.

The shops along First Avenue are vacant, after a Starbucks, Quiznos, UPS store and two bars pulled out. Both the longtime Owl ‘N Thistle pub and barber shop on Post Avenue remain.

One office tenant, Make-A-Wish Alaska and Washington, was pleased to hear of Bhullar’s plan.

“It sounds like a promising opportunity to revitalize the building since there has been so much tenant transition as a result of the pandemic,” Make-A-Wish spokesman Jessie Elenbaas told the newspaper.

The Colman Building, built in 1889 after the Great Fire leveled much of Seattle, is a city landmark on the National Register of Historic Places. It was restored, beginning in 1978.

Unico, which has done an office-to-home conversion in Tacoma, planned to convert the offices to homes in the Colman Building, but two years ago jettisoned the plan because of rising construction and finance costs.

In March 2023 its $22.4 million interest-only commercial mortgage-backed securities loan was placed with a special servicer due to “imminent monetary default,” according to a loan servicing report.

A subsequent report said Unico was “no longer willing to contribute additional capital into the property and has indicated its willingness to transition the property to the lender.”

— Dana Bartholomew