Feds to sell landmark Spring Street Courthouse in DTLA

Uncle Sam wants to unload a landmark federal courthouse in Downtown Los Angeles in what appears to be a fire sale.

The U.S. General Services Administration has listed the 17-story, 751,800-square-foot Spring Street Courthouse for “accelerated disposition” at 312 Spring Street, in Civic Center, Bisnow reported. An asking price was not disclosed.

The historic landmark was previously on a list of “noncore” properties marketed for sale that the GSA posted in early March, then took down less than a day later.

The Art Moderne building, designed by Gilbert Stanley Underwood, was completed in 1940 as the U.S. Post Office and Courthouse.

It’s been home to major court cases, including Gonzalo Mendez v. Westminster School District of Orange County, a major legal case advancing the civil rights of Mexican-Americans and a precursor to the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision.

It also housed a breach of contract case filed by Bette Davis against Warner Bros.

The gray courthouse building with vertical windows, bounded by Spring, Main, Temple and Aliso streets, was declared a National Historic Landmark in 2012.

Today, the granite and terra cotta building serves such tenants as the National Labor Relations Board, the Small Business Administration, the GSA and some Los Angeles Superior Court operations, according to the GSA.

The GSA did not respond to a request for comment from Bisnow about the building’s occupancy.

The investor pool for the historic properties may be shallow, according to Mike Condon, a commercial broker with Cushman & Wakefield in Los Angeles.

“When you see Class-A, trophy high-rises selling, ballpark, from around $125 a square foot, and those are typically already fully renovated, I think there will be some obvious challenges,” Condon told Bisnow.

Condon said he’d not be surprised by interest from a wealthy buyer or family office, who have been the primary investors in Downtown office buildings since the pandemic.

The GSA added the courthouse to a new list of disposition properties, which reflects “a more incremental approach focusing on a shorter list of assets that have already been evaluated” for factors including the cost of deferred maintenance for the building, according to a FAQ on the GSA site.

Spring Street Courthouse would be “tough” to sell, Aleks Trifunovic, president of Lee & Associates in West Los Angeles, told The Real Deal last spring.

“That one is for all intents and purposes — f****d,” Trifunovic said. “They should find a way to keep that one until Downtown comes back.”

— Dana Bartholomew