All about business

Investor Stacy Hastie says One City Centre will soon look more like 600 Washington, the new name given to the downtown St. Louis office tower, which will undergo a $29 million overhaul.

An investment entity managed by Hastie bought the 25-story building Wednesday by placing the only bid — $12.7 million — at a foreclosure sale. The sale extinguished the interest held by Pyramid Cos., which had planned to renovate One City Centre as part of its ambitious Mercantile Exchange project. Financial problems forced Pyramid to close in 2008.

Hastie is part of the effort to redo One City Centre and St. Louis Centre, a former mall that will be converted largely to parking. He said the foreclosure "is a big step forward" and means work is about to begin to move the building’s entrance to Washington Avenue. The building’s new name will reflect the reconfiguration.

In two weeks, the law firm Lewis, Rice & Fingersh will move to One City Centre, while LarsonAllen, an accounting firm, will move its St. Louis County offices to the building by June 1, Hastie said.

The foreclosure occurred a day after the Missouri Development Finance Board, a state agency, approved a $5 million loan for the One City Centre overhaul. It will be packaged with about $15 million in funds and debt from Hastie’s entities and $10.1 million in tax credits and city funds to pay for the rehab.

Less certain is the future of the Arcade building, at 800 Olive Street, which another Hastie-run investment entity bought out of foreclosure Wednesday. Hastie’s $9 million bid gave him control of the building, which Hastie plans to sell to another developer.

Earlier this week, investment entities managed by Hastie agreed to pay off the loans Bank of America made to Pyramid for the One City Centre and Arcade projects. Conversion of the Arcade into condos was under way in 2007 when Pyramid halted work. Bank of America filed a foreclosure notice in early December.

Source