Over 40 years of Experience in
Chicago
Real Estate

Featured Project 400 N Elizabeth

The property contains 62,169 square feet with a 38,000 square foot building that was to be vacated. The site is located at the northwest corner of Fulton Market and is situated at the northwest corner of Kinzie and Elizabeth Streets. Its initial C3-3 zoning allowed for a floor area ratio (“FAR”) of 186,498 square feet. MGA toured this property in August 2020, during the height of Covid.

MGA put the property under contract in November 2020, subject to a change in zoning to DX-5 allowing for the construction of a 503,568 square foot office building. We pursued the development, over the next 11 months, that was dedicated to the rezoning and design of a Life Sciences project.

MGA, with its team of architects, legal, engineering and life science experts spent extensive time on the project and obtained the zoning in October 2021. The building would have been one of the first, if not the first, ground- up developments in Chicago, to be designed for Life Sciences companies. Once the zoning was obtained, we closed on the land acquisition in January 2022.

Chicago has universities, hospitals, pharmaceutical and food companies to support a thriving Life Sciences community. All of this resulted in an expectation that the Chicago Life Sciences market would develop in a major way. However, once the Federal Reserve started tightening up on capital, the venture capital decreased significantly and the Life Sciences leasing market deteriorated quickly.
In spite of strong tenant and capital interest, we could see that the market was going to change. We switched gears in June 2022 and began exploring the idea of planning a multi-family residential development.

Subsequently, MGA connected with Ted Weldon. Ted was the head of residential multifamily development for Lend Lease before he began his own company, The Weldon Group (“TWG”). TWG has the experience of building 8 high-rise multifamily developments in the Chicago area. His experience and expertise in multifamily development complimented MGA’s skills. We formed a joint venture in early 2024 after we had begun the process of rezoning the land to incorporate a, two-tower, multifamily development and increase the FAR to a DX-7 (FAR of 714,000 square feet). Weldon’s input to this process was invaluable.

The partnership paid off MGA’s initial loan in January 2024 and successfully achieved the rezoning of the higher FAR in May 2024. The building was demolished in July 2024 with a groundbreaking scheduled in early 2025. In addition, we will be heating and cooling the buildings with geothermal technology, one of the first to do so in the Chicago Area.

All of this was achievable, because of the cost basis at which MGA acquired the land, the recognition of its underlying value, the ability to visualize its use and achieve the zoning. Under the current zoning, the property has now been appraised at over 3 times its original acquisition price – all a by product of vision and economics.