UPDATED 10/15/24 2:00pm
The new owner of Fort Worth’s tallest tower is … some random guy from rural Texas.
Burnett Plaza was sold to Andy Hansen Jr. after Pinnacle Bank foreclosed on the property in May and won it in a credit bid that appeared to amount to just $12 per square foot.
Hansen bought the property after reading about the foreclosure of the 40-story office building, he told the Dallas Business Journal.
It looked like Burnett Plaza changed hands for pennies, but there’s a $68 million senior loan on the property that the buyer will inherit. Hansen didn’t say how much he paid for the building, but loan documents show he borrowed $67.5 million from Pinnacle Bank.
Hansen is president of Stephenville-based Trafalgar Homes, which has developed more than 100 single family homes and more than 1,000 multifamily units.
Hansen ran for Stephenville City Council in 2015. The city of about 22,000 is in Erath County, about 70 miles southwest of Fort Worth.
“I love being a part of my church and a part of this community, and I have a passion for public service, and I feel it’s time for me to give back,” he told the Flash Today Erath County news publication in 2015.
He’s also the CEO of Hansen Stewardship Foundation, according to the organization’s form 990. It has given money to churches, a rehab center in San Antonio and a now-closed crisis pregnancy center in Stephenville.
Hansen has already gotten to work on Burnett Plaza, beginning to address the building’s $2.3 million worth of deferred maintenance, he told the Dallas Business Journal.
Despite the change in ownership, Hansen’s new trophy remains the subject of mortgage fraud allegations.
Shaya Prager’s Opal Holdings, Burnett Plaza’s previous owner, allegedly used an uncommon ground lease structure to borrow more than the building is worth.
The landlord and the ground lease tenant typically are two distinct entities. In the case of Burnett Plaza — and other Opal-owned properties throughout the country — both entities were allegedly affiliated with Prager.
Entities associated with Prager took out $169 million in loans on the building, which it purchased for $137.5 million. Pinnacle Bank, which lent $83 million to the ground lease tenant, claims Prager lied to the lender to get the loan.
Prager denies the claims.
“This transaction structure has been used more than two dozen times by entities owned by Mr. Prager, and yet Pinnacle is the only party involved in one of those transactions that claims it was not aware of the potential common beneficial ownership between the landlord and tenant,” a spokesperson for Prager said.
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Those allegations came to light in a lawsuit that Tarrant Construction Services filed against Prager, arguing he owes $1 million in construction costs.
The trial in that case is set for July 2025.
It’s unclear what Hansen will do with the ground lease. The deed of trust specifies that he inherits the ground lease but can replace or modify it.
This story was updated to include a statement from Shaya Prager.