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Renovations to the College House office and retail building in Harvard Square will begin in 2021 following the 50,000-square-foot office and retail building’s first change of ownership in a half-century.
New owner Gazit Horizons intends to implement a capital improvement plan to renovate the lobby, office common areas and building systems along with updates to create “exceptional retail space” with 20-foot ceilings following the planned 2021 departure of CVS and Santander Bank. Gazit paid $45 million for the property in a transaction that closed Tuesday.
The 50,000-square-foot building at 1430 Massachusetts Ave. was originally a Harvard University dorm and contains office space on the upper floors.
Gazit Horizons is a subsidiary of Israeli real estate investor Gazit-Globe that has been buying mixed-use properties in urban U.S. markets including Boston, New York and Miami, with eight Boston-area acquisitions in the past three years. The U.S. portfolio has maintained a 90-percent rent collection rate during the pandemic, Gazit Globe CEO Chaim Katzman said in a statement.
Brian Doherty and Dave Pergola of Cushman & Wakefield represented the seller on the sale. Cushman & Wakefield’s Tom Sullivan and Ross Fishman arranged acquisition financing from Hingham Institution for Savings.
