Baltimore Sun building under contract
The Calvert Street property rented by The Baltimore Sun and a nearby parking garage are under contract for purchase by Baltimore-based Atapco Properties.
Atapco’s Brian Conklin said the firm is doing due diligence on a deal. He declined to say when a sale might close or what interested the firm in the site.
A spokesman for Chicago-based Tribune Media, which owns The Sun office building and its parking garage next door, declined to comment.
The company, which spun off its newspapers in 2014 but kept their real estate, has been selling the properties associated with those businesses. It sold a Port Covington parcel, where The Sun’s printing presses are located, to Kevin Plank’s Sagamore Development for $46.5 million in 2014. The Sun has a long-term lease on that property.
Atapco has deep ties to Baltimore, tracing its roots to an oil company founded by Louis Blaustein in the city in 1910. The firm entered the real estate business in 1961, with the 30-story Blaustein tower in the city’s downtown business district. The firm’s portfolio today includes industrial, retail and residential projects in several states.
A deal for 501 N. Calvert St. headquarters and the parking garage appeared to be close last summer. But developer Mark Sapperstein, one of about six groups that submitted bids, eventually backed away, citing other family and business obligations.
The Sun’s lease would transfer in the event of a sale, spokeswoman Renee Mutchnik said. That agreement ends in 2018, when the company has options to renew. A large portion of the building is empty.