Reston Office Park Trades For $325M In Rare Pandemic-Era Deal
The D.C-area office investment sales market has been quiet throughout most of the coronavirus pandemic, but one Reston office deal surpassed all other sales in the market last quarter.
Boyd Watterson Asset Management acquired the Patriots Park office complex in Reston from South Korea's Hyundai Group in a deal that closed Sept. 25 for $325M, the Washington Business Journal reported Friday. CoStar news first reported the deal Sept. 30.
The 705K SF office campus is leased to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. Hyundai Group acquired it from Boston Properties in 2014 for $321M.
The nine-figure office sale is one of the only major deals to close in the region during the pandemic.
The D.C. Metro area recorded a total of $230M in office sales during Q3, according to a Newmark report that did not include the Patriots Park sale, which closed in the final days of the quarter. The report found no Northern Virginia office sales worth more than $20M closing last quarter.
The first half of the year had some large closings in the region, such as the Department of Transportation finalizing its $760M purchase of its D.C. headquarters in March, Boston Properties selling a pair of Herndon office buildings for $256M in March, and The Smithsonian Institution acquiring a Southwest D.C. office campus for $254M in June.
The office investment sales market in the second half of the year has suffered from the uncertainty of the pandemic combined with the looming presidential election, but experts predict more deals will close toward the end of the year and in Q1.
"I think even in the final months of the fourth quarter, we could see an increase in investment volume once the election has been decided," Newmark Senior Managing Director of National Marketing Research Sandy Paul said last week. "There is a lot of dry powder waiting on the sidelines."
The acquisition continues a string of investments in the region for Boyd Watterson. The firm last year bought two office buildings in NoMa for $180M and $140M, and it paid $105M for a L'Enfant Plaza office building.
