One Charles Center auction closes with winning bid of at least $4.4 million

One Charles Center, the landmark downtown office tower owned by the late former Orioles owner Peter Angelos sold at auction Thursday with a winning bid of at least $4.4 million, according to the website of Ten-X, which conducts online commercial real estate auctions.

It is not publicly known who bought the building, which is on the National Register of Historic Places as “the keynote” of downtown Baltimore’s 1960s renaissance.

Bradd Caplan, senior sales director for Ten-X, said he could not disclose the buyer’s identity or the final sales price until after closing, which will be in about a month.

Several downtown interests cheered the sale of the prominent building, which had been on the market since August 2022, noting that it could spark another revitalization of the central business district.

“The purchase of One Charles Center amplifies the momentum in downtown and adds to the evolving landscape,” Shelonda Stokes, president of the Downtown Partnership, said in a statement. “One Charles Center is an iconic building and has been a fixture in downtown Baltimore for decades, and we look forward to seeing how this sale contributes to our progress.”

The Angelos family opted to auction the property after it had entered into at least one contract to sell that had fallen through, Caplan said. The auction company offers an “accelerated process” of a no-contingency sale in less than 100 days, he said.

Angelos, who died March 23, bought the building, designed by modernist giant Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, for $6 million in 1996. The building most recently was assessed by the state at nearly $10 million.

Caplan characterized the sale price as “opportunistic,” or one that is attractive to the buyer. While the price struck some as low, they noted that other buildings have sold for less than previously as U.S. downtowns struggle with high vacancy rates and shifting workplace patterns.

“The real estate business is kind of crazy right now,” said Kim Clark, executive vice president of Baltimore Development Corp., the city’s economic development agency. “But it’s a significant building and we’re glad to see someone’s going to do something with it.”

The gleaming aluminum-and-glass skyscraper served as the headquarters for Angelos’ renowned law firm, which won hundreds of millions of dollars on behalf of victims of asbestos and tobacco and made him one of the state’s most powerful figures.

But as he fell ill and became incapacitated in recent years, a legal feud over his fortune erupted among his wife and two sons. The suit was settled in February 2023 and amid their troubles, the family sold off much of his assets : The Orioles went to a group headed by Baltimore native and private equity billionaire David Rubenstein, and the law firm to three of its senior attorneys.

The Angelos family put One Charles Center on the market with the possibility that it could be converted into apartments, as other downtown office buildings have. But it failed to sell and went to auction with a starting bid of $1.5 million.

A flurry of last-minute bids Thursday pushed the price above the reserve, and although scheduled to end at noon, the auction continued for almost 15 more minutes. Just before it ended, the Ten-X website listed a bid of $4.4 million and a purchase price of $4.51 million. Then the information on the bids dropped off the site and the building was listed as sold.

The 23-story building is about a third occupied, according to Ten-X’s listing.

Caplan declined to say how many bidders participated in the auction, but they came from across the country and included both those interested in it as an office building and those considering converting it to apartments. Bidders were required to show proof of adequate funds and were limited to bids of 110% of those funds, he said.

Downtown Baltimore has been in flux for years, with an exodus of companies moving their headquarters to newer areas like Harbor East and, since the COVID-19 pandemic, more employees working from home at least part of the time.

Still, downtown promoters note that there is an influx of employees, as the first of thousands of state workers have begun moving to the central business district from the aging State Center complex in Midtown.

Some observers note that when One Charles Center was built in 1962, it was a time when downtown’s viability was similarly uncertain. Its sale could again bode well for the central business district, they said.

“The opening of One Charles Center was of enormous importance in showing that Baltimore’s downtown could rebound from hard times,” said Johns Hopkins, executive director of the historic and architectural preservation organization Baltimore Heritage. “It provided more than offices. It lifted the spirits of people who cared about the city and were working hard for it.

“I think today’s sale of the building and promise of new residents and tenants also provides great hope for the future of downtown,” he said.

The entire Charles Center development was a “thoughtful response to the shrinking of downtowns across the country after World War II,” Hopkins said. And its success led to Baltimore similarly re-imagining its downtown waterfront as Harborplace, he said.

Jay Brodie, a former BDC president, also pointed to One Charles Center’s earlier role in reviving downtown.

“One Charles Center was a great signal that downtown was breathing and alive,” Brodie said. “It was a breakthrough in the psyche of downtown Baltimore, which was pretty dismal at the time.”

Now, as downtown goes through yet another “metamorphosis,” he said he looks forward to what the new buyer will do with the building, whether it’s converting it to housing or the new kind of office spaces that companies now look for.

Stokes said downtown is “in the midst of the next renaissance,” citing the recently reopened CFG Bank Arena and the more than 5,000 state employees who will be moving into the “heart” of downtown.

“This investment in One Charles Center,” she said, “is a major contribution.”