News

Steelbridge Capital, which exited the Tampa market at the peak of the last real estate cycle, is back in the Bay region.

Steelbridge has acquired Park Place Office & Promenade, a Clearwater office park at 11, 410, 420 and 430 Park Place Blvd. The park includes a six-story, 118,447-square-foot office building and three, single-story, promenade-style buildings, totaling 50,221 square feet.

The buildings sold for $22 million in a deal that closed Sept. 24, according to Pinellas County property records. Equity Office Properties Trust, based in Chicago, was the seller.

John Gerlach, vice president of investment services at Colliers International Tampa Bay, represented the seller in the transaction.

“The Tampa Bay office market has attracted more and more institutional and private equity sources of capital over the recent years,” Gerlach said in a statement. “The sale of Park Place is a good example — Pinellas County is attracting these sources of capital because of its high quality of life that attracts a strong workforce and in return draws businesses, especially in the financial and technology sectors.”

The property was 96 percent occupied at the time of sale, according to Colliers. Tenants include Threattrack, ISC2, Orange Business Services, Malewarebytes and Senior Home Care.

“We are pleased to be back in Tampa buying office property,” Mike Manno, principal at Steelbridge Real Estate Services, said in a statement. “After our successes in the last cycle with such properties as the Urban Centre and Sunforest I and II in Westshore, and Bushwood II and III in North Tampa, we are focused on expanding our Tampa Bay regional footprint.”

Steelbridge sold Urban Centre for $105 million in 2005 and Sunforest for $20.5 million in 2004. The Buschwood properties sold for $8 million in 1997.

Ashley Gurbal Kritzer is senior reporter for the Tampa Bay Business Journal.