Dealmaker: HFF Secures $233M in Construction Financing

Holliday Fenoglio Fowler closed a $233 million construction loan for CNA Center, a 35-story Class A+ office tower in Chicago’s West Loop neighborhood.

HFF worked for the property’s developer, The John Buck Co., Chicago, and placed the construction loan with Bank of the Ozarks, Little Rock, Ark.

CNA Center will become insurance firm CNA’s world headquarters and the national headquarters for law firm Hinshaw & Culbertson LLP. The finished office tower will include 807,000 rentable square feet and a 500-stall attached parking garage.

HFF Senior Managing Director Michael Kavanau and Managing Director Danny Kaufman led the debt placement team.

“We experienced a very strong response from the capital markets to CNA Center,” Kavanau said. “There have been very few new office towers built in this cycle and very strong tenant demand for new Class A+ space.”

HFF also secured $66 million to refinance Plaza 183, a 361,000-square-foot open-air retail center in Cerritos, Calif. HFF Senior Managing Directors Paul Brindley and Eric Tupler and Analyst Steven Paskover worked for borrower Cerritos Retail CenterCal LLC to secure the 10-year fixed-rate loan with Principal Life Insurance Co., Des Moines, Iowa. The loan refinanced the original acquisition/renovation financing.Principal Real Estate Investors advised the lender in the transaction. 

Currently more than 97 percent leased, the 11-building power center houses national tenants including Nordstrom Rack, Saks Off Fifth, T.J. Maxx and Olive Garden. 

Cerritos sits midway between downtown Los Angeles and the business centers of Irvine, Santa Ana and Anaheim two blocks south of Highway 90. More than 244,000 vehicles pass by the center per day due to its frontage along the 605 Freeway.