Office, retail project to rise near GU

Journal of Business, Feb 7, 2008 by Proffitt, Emily

A Spokane company plans to develop a three-story, retail and office building on Hamilton Street just east of Gonzaga University.

Plans call for the structure, to be called Hamilton Square, to include a total of 36,000 square feet of floor space, says Greg Byrd, of Spokane-based Byrd Real Estate Group LLC, who is marketing the property. Byrd also is the manager of the company, LLC & M,L.L.C., that is developing the project.

Hamilton Square will be located on a nearly 2-acre site at 1000 N. Hamilton, at the northeast corner of Hamilton Street and Cataldo Avenue, just north of a vehicle emission testing center, Byrd says. Three houses that were located on the site have been torn down, and a 5,000-square-foot warehouse on the southeastern portion of the property will be demolished before construction starts on the project, he says.

The ground floor of the building is expected to have up to six retail tenants, he says.

The upper two floors are to have enough Class A space to accommodate up to eight office users. Retailers have expressed interest in the development, but no leases have been signed yet, he says.

Byrd says he's looking for potential office tenants, but that the office market has been volatile lately.

The company doesn't want to build the project on a speculative basis entirely, so it will wait to land some tenants before starting construction.

"With Sirti and Gonzaga nearby, we think there are some medical office users and others that would like to be in that location," Byrd says. "A lot of retailers are interested in it because of all the traffic on Hamilton."

The development company, which hasn't selected a contractor yet, hopes to land enough tenants to start construction by next fall, he says. The project, which would take nine months to complete, was designed by Architectural Ventures, of Spokane, he says.

Byrd declines for now to disclose an estimated cost for the project.

Projects of similar size and scope in Spokane typically cost between $135 and $175 per square foot, real estate experts here say, which would give Hamilton Square a value of roughly $5 million to $6 million.