Mission Accomplished by Boston Realty Advisors Team

BOSTON — Given the city’s white-hot multifamily market, Boston Realty Advisors had anticipated a listing of two Mission Hill apartment buildings would garner multiple Longwood Medical Area, commercial and healthcare operations might find the 5.5-story property of value, adds Colliers investment sales leader Lisa M. Campoli as her firm prepares a call for offers reported to be due over the coming week. Designed by Shepley Bulfinch, the ornate building is being pitched minus an asking price, and Campoli would not provide guidance as to where competition might be trending as the deadline approaches. It is also unclear whether the activity is from local bidders or includes institutional prospects who might be piqued by the heft of the erstwhile Goddard House.

While Campoli would not discuss the process being orchestrated on behalf of Goddard, she does acknowledge what had been anticipated when it was first being offered for sale—multifamily of some ilk is most likely the future destiny for 201 South Huntington Ave. “The dominant interest has been from residential developers,” confirms Campoli, whose team handling the prominent asset includes Gail McDonough, Peter Gori, Anthony Hayes and Timothy Mulhall. In marketing materials prepared for prospects, 201 South Huntington Ave. is praised for its solid demographics as a residential use, and highlights physical attributes favoring such a direction. ‘It has great bones for a conversion to residential,” says Campoli. Elements would include limited depth of the structure, providing abundant natural light and numerous window lines for a building set in an amazingly wooded twoacre setting overlooking Leverett Pond and Olmsted Park. “It truly is a unique location,” says Campoli, and one recently improved in the opening of a Whole Foods supermarket nearby. The E-Line trolley to downtown Boston and to East Cambridge in the other direction begins a mere block away, with additional supermarkets on Huntington Avenue helping make for “an exceptional transit-oriented location,” says the Colliers materials that estimates 45,000 people are employed in the LMA, many of them healthcare professionals including doctors and life sciences researchers.

Besides the building’s pedigree and a convenient location, the sheer demand for multifamily units could be the deciding factor in turning the tide that way, concurs Campoli, particularly given plentiful debt available for such projects and a city administration championing the creation of new units.