Hana Alternative to sell NASA HQ acquired in 2017

Hana Alternative Assets Management Co. is looking for a buyer of Two Independence Square in Washington D.C., the NASA headquarters. Hana has selected real estate firm Cushman & Wakefield plc as a sales advisor, an official from the Hana Financial Group's alternative investment arm told The Korea Economic Daily. 

The details on the sales plan have not been confirmed, the official said.

In 2016, Hana and brokerage firm Korea Investment & Securities Co. led a Korean consortium and teamed up with US asset manager Ocean West Capital Partners to purchase the building. In July 2017, the South Korean asset manager completed the acquisition of the property from US-based Piedmont Office Realty Trust for $360 million. The deal was made through Hana Alternative Investment NASA REIT I with a five-year maturity.

At the time, the Hana-led consortium was picked as a new preferred buyer of the property after Korea’s KTB Asset Management Co. withdrew from the deal. KTB dropped the deal shortly after the election of Donald Trump as president of the US roiled global financial markets.

The nine-story, 605,897-square-foot building in Washington was built in 1992. NASA, renting 99% of the building, renewed its contract in 2011 with a lease term until 2028. The basic rent per month is $170 million, Hana said.

Founded in 2006, the Korean alternative asset manager has actively invested in global real estate assets. 

In May of 2021, the asset manager acquired a logistics center in Osaka, Japan for ¥14.8 billion ($127.8 million), marking the first investment by a Korean firm in Japan’s real estate market since the outbreak of COVID-19. The deal is expected to deliver a return of more than double the 4% average of Korean logistics real estate, Hana said at the time.

Hana also announced in July of 2021 it is expected to achieve an annualized return of 9.83% from the $51.5 million mezzanine loan for Boston’s Seaport District, a luxury residential development. The Korean asset manager arranged the loan in April 2019, as part of a $300 million mezzanine tranche led by US real estate developer Cottonwood Group.

Last December, LA Hana OW, an entity between Hana and Ocean West Capital Partners, sold the DreamWorks headquarters campus in California for 390 billion won ($326.8 million) to Brookfield Real Estate Investment Trust. The seven-building, 497,403-square-foot office campus is 100% leased to DreamWorks Animation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Comcast Corp., running through 2035.

Write to A-Young Yoon at youngmoney@hankyung.com
Jihyun Kim edited this article.