Golden Valley's Colonnade building sold for $100 million

The Colonnade, the office tower near the I-394 and Hwy. 100 intersection that is the corporate home of Pentair and Buffalo Wild Wings, was sold this week for about twice as much as it went for six years ago.

The global investment firm Starwood Capital, based in Greenwich, Conn., paid about $100 million for the 356,339-square-foot Class A building, in a deal finalized Thursday.

The buyer could not be reached for immediate comment.

The Colonnade, located at 5500 Wayzata Blvd. in Golden Valley near the West End shopping and business district, has been owned by G & I VII Colonnade LLC, a fund managed by DRA Advisors LLC since 2011. It bought the property for $50.4 million, according to Hennepin County property records.

The fund put the 16-story office tower up for sale in late April. "With full-service amenities and significant recent capital improvements, the Colonnade far exceeds the quality of other assets in the West End area," Ryan Watts, one of the brokers at CBRE responsible for marketing the property, said at that time.

The building, built in 1988, has a four-story atrium, fitness center and 1,100-stall parking ramp. The market value of the complex is $13.2 million, according to Hennepin County property records.

It is 98 percent leased by tenants including Pentair, Buffalo Wild Wings, Bell Bank and Comcast.

The transaction appears to be the priciest for a Twin Cities suburban office on a per-square-foot basis, going for $280 per square foot.

Three years ago, the state's largest office property, the Normandale Lake Office Park in Bloomington, was sold for $369 million. At 1.7 million square feet, that deal amounted to $217 per square foot.

The Minneapolis CBRE group that represented the seller was Watts, Judd Welliver, Sonja Dusil and Tom Holtz.

Patrick Thomas • 612-673-7740