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Traded in 2005 for $19 Million, Dearborn Building Now on the Sales Block for $390,000

The former home of automotive supplier Plastech (and my former junior high school, Adams, and before that Dearborn High School) is now on the sales block for a starting bid of $390,000.

Known as the Dearborn Atrium Office Center, the building at 835 Mason between Garrison and Morley, traded in 2005 for $19 million.

Traded in 2005 for $19 million, bidding for the Dearborn Atrium begins at $390,000.

As the listing for the buildings states: “This is an excellent opportunity for a user or investor to buy a quality office building at a substantial discount.” In this case, “substantial” seems like an understatement.

With its nearby parking deck, you could see this building being transformed into downtown lofts or how about student housing? There are lots of possibilities for this building that was built in 1916. The former school was completely renovated to the shell in 1994 and the listing says warranties still exist from those renovations.

The property consists of two three-story office buildings and a covered parking structure consisting of 90,774 square feet and 307 parking spaces. The two office buildings consist of 133,001 net rentable square feet and 154,104 square feet of gross building area and sit on 4.09 acres. The listing states that the average household incomes are more than $76,000 within one mile of the property and and the population is more than 103,000 people in a three mile radius.

Let the dreaming begin . . .

This entry was posted on Friday, May 21st, 2010 at 9:00 am and is filed under Business. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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  • oldalldayschoolmom

    Years ago, I was told the building was sold to Kajoian (extremely successful Michigan developer) for $1…after it was closed as a school and was sitting there vacant.

    I also was told the building was designed by famed architect Albert Kahn, so let’s hope it won’t go the way of the wrecking ball as others of his have in Dearborn.

  • Abe

    Hakim Fahoury is said to be extremely interested — seller beware of Hakim.

  • cornerstore

    So, I did not see the end of the bidding. I had been following it since bidding started. Bidding was supposed to start on the 17th, but did not start until 5-18. As of one hour to the end of bidding the high bid was $790,000. The next incremental bid was $815,000. At that time, the reserve had not been met. Was anyone else watching this? I really have no knowledge of how these auctions work. I have to assume that the property was not sold, but do not know this since I did not see the end of the auction. What’s next? Any ideas?

  • cloe

    Beware of Hakim Fakhoury and whatever name he is using at the time. It would be a shame to see another landmark of Dearborn fall into ruin under his ownership. Besides, why would he want to get involved? Remember “The dream is dead”.

  • NObama & NOreilly

    If anyone approved of this deal back in 2005 that is still part of council or administration, then they should be fired immediately for incompetence. How in the world can a piece of property drop from $19M value down to $400k in a 5 year period? That is an unrealistic 98% drop in value. I smell fish on this one.

    Deep – is there any investigation going on behind the scenes to get all the facts on the table regarding this situation? From the surface, this doesn’t even seem real. If there a plan that new business will come in driving up additional tax revenues?

  • Michael D. Albano

    The past few years I have contacted Hakim Fakhoury. If you ask to meet with Hakim alone or as a group, he will meet with you and answer your tough questions and regardless of what some may believe, he is a very nice man.

    Hakim bought a large amount of mostly decaying downtown west Dearborn (DTWD) property when property values were better. He’s spent millions rebuilding them, with long delays in some properties, mostly due to this terrible economy, user paid parking, contractors backing out due to the economy and some city disagreements. While I might have handled some issues differently, hindsight is 20/20 and there is no one that has invested that heavily in DTWD. Downtown has far more vacancies that it’s ever had regardless of property or business owner.

    Let’s also remember this is THE worst economic crisis since the Great .Depression, Ford eliminated 70,000 white collar jobs in Dearborn the past 2+ years., not including Ford UAW blue collar worker cutbacks, employees that contributed significantly to Dearborn’s economy and health. During the Orville Hubbard regime Ford paid 80% of the total city property taxes. Today they pay about 20% of total property taxes and property values have plummeted everywhere.

    Furthermore, Dearborn has the additional expense to maintain far more amenities and services that comparable cities, like our 8 pools built in the 50′s – 60′s and more. I’m not sure it can all be blamed on council or business owners and I do not envy the predicament they are in today and wish I had answers.

    It is rare that a single council member states individually what they’ve accomplished, mainly because councils work as a team – group recognized, not individual recognized.

    I’ve worked with Councilman Abraham who has lead implementing a Crime Free Housing Program that would help neighborhoods and our police with escalating rental issues. Now the city is exploring this option with much credit to Abraham and perhaps other leaders.

    Mark Shooshanian is not big on taking personal credit, but if you need something, he gets it done. He’s is one of the most down to earth politicians I’ve ever met and he gets a lot done that people don’t hear about.

    George Darany attends many Dearborn Federation of Neighborhood Association meetings and works almost full time for Dearborn. Abraham, Darany and Shooshanian are one reason the optional $2.00 user paid parking fee was implemented in DTWD. It might not be the free parking we wanted, but it sure beats constantly refilling meters or getting a parking ticket. Many business owners there tell me it’s helped.

    Brian Rafalski’s 1st term started 01/02/10, he has been a very involved volunteer in many Dearborn civic organizations and is an extremely intelligent man. He at least is new and deserves a chance in my opinion…

    Thanks to council listening to residents and the wonderful group Save Our Pools (SOP), 6 of 8 of our neighborhood pools that might have closed permanently, are open for at least this season. Had it not been for council, only one city library would be open instead of four for now.

    I disagree and debate with individual council members at times, but they’re healthy debates and I end up being better informed of issues they face and other times council does act if what you request is reasonable and affordable.

    The best thing I can suggest to others not happy with government, is to invoke the best American right we have by voting in every election, getting involved as a city volunteer and contacting city leaders regularly. No city I know of is successful without this.

    Perhaps others have different opinions that I’d be glad to read and consider.

  • oldalldayschoolmom

    Someone named Harold Koss of Bloomfield is listed as the principal who bought the Atrium in 2005 for $19,000,000 under the of “Dearborn Tech LLC”

    Follow the money trail here:
    http://www.dleg.state.mi.us/bcs_corp/results.asp?ID=B6251Q&page_name=llc

    Remember our fallen soldiers this weekend…

  • oldalldayschoolmom