Pasadena’s Alexandria Real Estate Buys Landmark Office Property in Seattle

Alexandria Real Estate Equities in Pasadena has acquired the 5th & Bell Building in Seattle for $95 million.

Alexandria bought the building from Blackstone, which acquired the building from Hines for almost $93 million, part of a larger portfolio sale less than two years ago. The sale was reported on the Daily Journal of Commerce website.

Fifth & Bell is a 203,000-square-foot, six-level office building in the heart of Seattle’s Belltown neighborhood. It occupies the half-block site at 2301 Fifth Ave., between Battery and Bell streets. It was developed in 2002 by Touchstone, with about 197,000 rentable square feet, street-level retail, and 209 underground parking stalls.

Completed in 2002 after 22 months of construction, the building was named the National Association of Industrial and Office Properties Office Development of the Year for that year. The architect was Collins Woerman.

The Daily Journal of Commerce report said both parties used LLCs in the transaction; no brokers were announced.

Amazon has a 10-year lease on the building signed in 2014, with renewal options for another 10 years. Other tenants include Zipcar, Phillips Design and the University of Washington, according to the report.

Alexandria now has about 1 million rentable square feet in Seattle. Its seven buildings, clustered in South Lake Union and Eastlake, are mostly leased to life-science and biotech companies.

The firm is also currently developing a new speculative building with 205,000 square feet of offices in the city.