Unico Properties Sells Final Utah Tower, Exits State After Decade of Consolidation

Unico Properties is selling 250 Tower, the final building in its Utah portfolio, and exiting the state market. The 16-story glass office structure at 250 E. 200 S. is being marketed by CBRE’s National Office Partners team in Salt Lake City. Brokers Phil Brierley, Cole Macadaeg, and Charley Will are leading the effort, though no asking price has been published.

The 374,772-square-foot tower was built in 1984 and formerly known as the CenturyLink building. CBRE classifies it as a Class A, LEED Gold property. A 2017 renovation added an auditorium conference center, a second-floor outdoor terrace, and a fitness and yoga center. The building includes a five-story, 461-stall garage and 31 surface stalls, providing 1.31 parking spaces per 1,000 square feet.

Unico, based in Seattle, has scaled back its holdings in recent years. The firm sold the data center building across the street to Dart Interests in 2023. It also sold the City Centre building to the University of Utah that same year and previously owned the Boston Building. The sale of 250 Tower marks the end of Unico’s direct ownership in Utah.

The University of Utah serves as the anchor tenant, occupying 38% of the building’s leased space. The university has anchored the tower since 2017 and renewed its lease in 2022. At that time, the university reduced its footprint and staggered lease expirations. Other recent tenants include Forvis Mazars, Reaveley Engineers, and Stride Bank, which have renewed or signed leases since 2021.

CBRE is pitching the tower’s vacancy as its primary asset. The building has 108,638 square feet of vacant space across contiguous full floors. Brokers state that no other block larger than 50,000 square feet is available downtown. This scarcity positions 250 Tower as a rare option for large tenants seeking space in the urban core.

The offering memorandum notes that a buyer would enter at a stabilized cost more than 70% below the price of new construction for a comparable tower. CBRE highlights that no new office building has been delivered downtown since 2022, with none under construction or expected within five years. Class A leasing from 2021 to 2025 ran more than 1.4 times the 2018-2019 average, with eight consecutive quarters of positive absorption.

Surrounding development supports the investment case. Seven Type I projects have added more than 1,500 apartments within four blocks of the tower over the past five years. The rebuild of 200 South as a bus rapid transit corridor has also improved access. The former Mountain Bell data center across the street is slated for demolition in 2027 to make way for an upper-upscale hotel, though no public proposal exists yet.

Phil Brierley told the industry at the ULI Utah Trends conference on October 20 that the office market is more split than averages suggest. While overall vacancy in CBRE’s third-quarter report was 21.8%, prime vacancy near Downtown was 6.5%. Class B vacancy sat at 27.3%.

Class A asking rents in the central business district reached a record $40.08 per square foot, up 10.9% from a year earlier. CBRE counted no office projects under construction, compared with about 2.9 million square feet across 16 projects at the 2020 peak. Brierley noted that big contiguous blocks are scarce in top buildings, forcing tenants to renew in place or move into existing space.

This listing contrasts with reports from early 2024, when the regional office market posted nearly 1 million square feet of negative absorption in 2023. The current strategy relies on the specific dynamics of prime vacancy and limited new supply in the downtown core.