Duball Picks Up Historic DC Office Building for Resi Conversion
The property will include 161 rental units once work is done.
An affiliate of Duball has purchased a 190,385-square-foot, Class B office building with plans to convert the property into a 161-unit multifamily community. A subsidiary of BrightSpire Capital sold the Longfellow Building in Washington, D.C., for $21.5 million. JLL Capital Markets represented the seller.
BrightSpire took ownership of the 1941-built property at a foreclosure auction in November 2023 for $21.1 million, Bisnow reported. Coworking company Expansive previously owned the building prior to the foreclosure, which traded for $73.6 million in 2019, Yardi Matrix data shows.
Before the mayor can issue a building permit, the D.C. Historic Preservation Review Board must consider applications if the permit regards a historic landmark or property within a historic district. Duball applied for review by the board in June. Maurice Walters | Architect designed the plans. One month later, the Dupont Circle Conservancy approved the project.
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The Longfellow Building rises 12 stories and features 15,500-square-foot rectangular floorplates with uniform column grids, making it well positioned for a multifamily conversion. Plans call for its restoration closer to the 1941 design provided by Lescaze and the removal of the existing granite over-cladding added in a prior 1980 renovation.
Floorplans are set to feature studio, one- and two-bedroom units ranging between 463 and 1,276 square feet. The property is slated to receive a new rooftop addition that will include amenity spaces such as a lounge, party room, bar and swimming pool. The ground floor is set to provide 8,454 square feet of retail space.
Located at 1201 Connecticut Ave. NW, the Longfellow Building is within walking distance of the White House and George Washington University. Several parks, transit stops and quick-service restaurants can be found nearby.
The JLL Capital Markets team of Senior Managing Directors Tom Hall, Jim Meisel, Andrew Weir and Matt Nicholson, alongside Senior Director Dave Baker, as well as Director Kevin Byrd represented the seller.
Office-to-multifamily conversions in D.C.
Mayor Muriel Bowser’s D.C. Comeback Plan—which launched in January 2023—set the five-year economic development strategy for the District. The Downtown Action Plan serves to identify strategies, programs and initiatives that reimagine and reinvigorate Downtown D.C.
What’s more, in March, the mayor and the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development launched the District’s Housing in Downtown Program, which features a 20-year tax abatement for new residential development.
These strategies and programs include office-to-residential conversions, with D.C. having five projects under construction and 11 in the pipeline as of March. Nationally, the District led the office-to-apartment conversions, with some 3,000 units in various stages of development as of May.
Earlier this year, Community Three and Whitaker Investment Corp. secured financing for an office-to-residential conversion project in Alexandria, Va., roughly 7 miles from downtown D.C. Kennedy Wilson issued a $96 million loan for TideLock’s development. The 1980-built office tower served as the American Physical Therapy Association’s headquarters. Once complete, the community will include 169 rental units, 65 luxury condominiums and some 7,000 square feet of retail space.
