“Another serious investment in Bellevue, WA. Hines jumps in to buy into the 425 unit Main Street Flats on Main Street, a month after announcing its 1.6 million SF mixed-use project Main Street Place a block away. The Eastside office market is expanding exponentially led by Amazon, and alongside Facebook, Google and Microsoft expansion plans over the next few years. Exciting times for Bellevue and the greater Eastside market place…!”
A month after announcing plans to develop a 1.6-million-square-foot mixed-use project called Main Street Place in downtown Bellevue, Hines is now co-owner of Main Street Flats, a large luxury apartment development about a block to the east.
On Monday, Hines said that along with a subsidiary of funds managed by Oaktree Capital Management LP, it acquired the 425-unit Main Street Flats at 10505 Main St. The price was $232.5 million, according to King County records.
Dallas-based Alamo Manhattan developed Main Street Flats last decade. Now Amazon is expanding in downtown Bellevue, where it plans to have around 25,000 employees in the coming years. Facebook and Google also are expanding on the Eastside, and Microsoft is in the midst of an expansion of its Redmond headquarters.
“The Eastside office market, including downtown Bellevue, is experiencing unprecedented growth from many of the world’s largest technology tenants, and this influx of new jobs is driving residential demand in premium locations such as Bellevue,” Hines Director John Coombs said in a news release.
“We have long held a strong conviction for the Bellevue submarket and believe our timing, with all of the momentum on the Eastside, couldn’t be better,” he said.
Hines previously said the Main Street Place development, located on 6.75 acres between Main and Second streets and 108th and 110th avenues Northeast, will consist of approximately 1.2 million square feet of office towers plus 400 units of low-rise apartments. At street level 90,000 square feet of retail and “amenity spaces” are planned along with public open space and pedestrian corridors that wind their way through the site.
USAA Real Estate of San Antonio is Hines’ investment partner on Main Street Place. The project is being developed on a 100-year-plus ground lease with Benenson Capital Partners, a 115-year-old, family-owned company based in New York City that has owned the site for decades.
Main Street Flats is the second recent large apartment sale in downtown Bellevue.
The Brio apartments at 11130 NE 10th St., sold for $170 million, according to King County records. Project developer Su Development of Bellevue sold the 259-unit project to an affiliate of UDR of Denver, according to a Seattle Daily Journal of Commerce report.
By Marc Stiles – Staff Writer, Puget Sound Business Journal
July 20, 2021, 12:04 am EDT