Or best offer: Facing default, Loop office building hits market

The owner of a historic Loop office building that is suing its sole tenant for skipping out on a long-term lease deal is now looking to sell the troubled asset.

Rampante Realty has hired JLL to unload the 487,000-square-foot vacant property, according to Crain’s. There is no current asking price on the building, which Rampante listed last year for $100 million.

But the Florida-based investor is in hot water of its own, troubles that have been made worse by the coronavirus crisis. The company, which paid $68 million for the building — and spent another $5 million in renovations — is at risk of default for missing April and May debt service payments, Crain’s reported.

Rampante took out a $48 million loan on the landmark property when it acquired it four years ago. Last month, Robert Morris University vacated its 355,000 square feet at the building, which it had leased since 1996. Rampante sued the school for its April rent of $1 million and said the school still owed tens of millions more for the four years remaining on the lease. The university left the 401 S. State Street building recently, after the school was acquired by Roosevelt University.

Rampante’s financial woes come as scores of investors face similar problems during the pandemic. In March, Colony Capital CEO Tom Barrack predicted a coming crisis in the commercial mortgage market because of the virus. According to a report this week, Colony has defaulted on $3.2 billion in loans backed by hotel and health care properties. [Crain’s] — Alexi Friedman