A 116-year-old building that for years harkened to Chattanooga's manufacturing past before it was refashioned into apartments and commercial space has fetched a $15.75 million sale price.
A Nashville real estate firm has purchased the Fleetwood Building at East 11th and King streets about a block from Chattanooga City Hall, said Kelly Fitzgerald, vice president of commercial brokerage for SVN Second Story Real Estate Management.
She said 3MC Partners of Nashville bought the 70,296-square-foot structure from Chattanooga-based Noon Development.
"It's a very unique product," Fitzgerald said in a telephone interview. "You don't have a lot of historic buildings converted to lofts. It has really good bones to it."
Chris Sanders of 3MC Partners said plans are to keep the Fleetwood name on the structure that until the 1970s held the Fleetwood Coffee Co. roasting business.
Sanders said there's a need for downtown living, and he cited the Fleetwood's proximity to restaurants and shopping.
Warehouse Row is about a block away from the Fleetwood, as is King Street Station, another old brick structure made over into office and commercial space. In addition, the Fleetwood sits within a few blocks of the redeveloping M.L. King District, where a Slim & Husky's pizzeria recently opened to anchor a new mixed-use, three-story building.
"Chattanooga is a great market with positive demand drivers, and the downtown area has great momentum," Sanders said in an email.
Fitzgerald said the Fleetwood has 63 residential units and seven commercial spaces.
"It's in a really good spot," she said about the site, noting it's within walking distance of much of downtown.
The Fleetwood was vacant for many years after coffee roasting and packaging stopped at the site. But last decade, work started to remake the structure into living space.
Sanders said that at the property level, the Fleetwood is "a stabilized and steady deal." But, he said, he still sees room for improvement for both the commercial and residential tenants.
Sanders said the company recently purchased the Ridgeside Flats apartments near McCallie Avenue in Chattanooga.
"We will be deploying significant capital into that property on both the interior and exterior fronts," he said.
Chattanooga has seen a recent string of out-of-town real estate companies invest in housing in the city.
A California investor, Horiates Chatt LLC, purchased a new apartment complex for $6.1 million that opened this summer at Main Street and Central Avenue.
Material Ventures, another Nashville firm, this summer bought the Burnside development on downtown's Southside with plans to add to the renovated warehouses and possibly buy other properties in the area.
In February, the Passenger Flats apartment complex behind the Chattanooga Choo Choo sold to a real estate partnership formed in Knoxville for $17.2 million.
Contact Mike Pare at mpare@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6318. Follow him on Twitter @MikePareTFP.