Roughly a year after a sale that was cloaked in secrecy, the Westinghouse Electric Co. headquarters in Cranberry is back on the market.
Seattle-based Thomas Company is marketing the 823,979-square-foot campus for sale only 16 months after it was purchased by a New York-based global investor.
There is no listing price for the property, which sold for an announced price of $180 million in January 2020 but was docketed at $145.4 million in a deed transfer report.
Jeffrey Thomas, managing director of Thomas Company, said Thursday he is just starting the process of marketing the real estate. He added there likely will be a call for offers and a set date for bids.
He did not want to speculate why the seller is deciding to market the property after owning it for such a short time. “I just assume it makes sense for them at this point,” he said. “I don’t know what the motivations are.”
The sale of the property last year created a stir, in large part because of the way it was structured.
At the time, according to public documents, then-owner Columbia Property Trust created subsidiaries CF Cranberry LLC and CF Cranberry Holdings II LLC, related to the real estate it then sold to the new owner, identified in mortgage documents as Fortress Credit Advisors LLC.
Fortress Credit appeared to be related to Fortress Investment Group, a New York-based global investment manager.
Gordon Runte, a Fortress Investment Group spokesman, did not return requests for comment.
In announcing the sale, neither Columbia Property nor the Jones Lang LaSalle real estate firm, which represented the seller and recruited the buyer, divulged the name of the new owner. JLL stated only it was an “institutional investor.”
Complicating the transaction last year was a discrepancy between the announced $180 million sales price and the $145.4 million price listed on the deed transfer report.
The difference prompted Cranberry Township to ask the state Department of Revenue to look into the transaction to determine if the proper amount of deed transfer tax was paid.
Cranberry estimated the discrepancy cost the township and the Seneca Valley School District each $175,000 in transfer taxes and the state $350,000.
Making the transaction even more complex was that no deed changed hands. Instead, it involved the sale of the entities that owned the real estate.
In Pennsylvania, in situations where 90% or more of a real estate entity is sold, the deed transfer tax is based on the “computed value” of the real estate held by the acquired company, not the price paid for the acquisition of the company itself.
A Columbia Property representative stated in a letter to the township and the school district in March 2020 the full deed transfer tax was paid “based upon computed value in accordance with the laws of the Commonwealth.”
Cranberry manager Dan Santoro said the township has not received an official response from the state regarding its deed transfer tax inquiry.
Jeffrey Johnson, a Department of Revenue spokesman, said he was unable to comment on specific transactions because of taxpayer confidentiality laws.
Gregg Broujos, regional principal of the Colliers International real estate firm Downtown, said he expects interest in the Westinghouse property to be “incredibly strong.”
“We have seen over the last few months an incredible demand for commercial real estate investment of all types. That is due to the low interest rate environment and the pent-up demand from investment firms that have equity sitting on the sidelines for the last year,” he said.
Mr. Broujos believes Fortress can make a profit on a sale even though it has only owned the property for about 16 months. He said JLL has done a good job finding tenants for some of the property’s subleased space.
Completed in 2009, the Westinghouse campus houses executive offices and research and development and support functions, as well as amenities such as a bank branch, a cafeteria and tennis, basketball and volleyball courts.
Westinghouse leases the property from the owner.
Since 2007, the owner has been receiving abatements on township, school district and Butler County real estate taxes as part of a strategic development area created by the state to keep Westinghouse in Pennsylvania.
In 2006, officials calculated the taxes abated amounted to about $1.3 million annually. The property will be back on the tax rolls next year.
Mark Belko: mbelko@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1262.
First Published: April 23, 2021, 9:16 a.m.
Updated: April 23, 2021, 9:17 a.m.
