Excerpted from Tampa Bay Business Journal story.
The decision to keep the Austin Center an office park — and not knock it down and start over — wasn’t an easy one for Andrew Wright.
In early 2019, Wright’s Ally Capital Group paid $28.9 million for the Austin Center, a five-story, 300,000-square-foot office park in the heart of Tampa’s Westshore business district. Built in the 1970s and sitting on just shy of 10.5 acres, the Austin Center has been eyed for years as a massive, mixed-use redevelopment play.
But over the last 11 months, Wright and his partners have arrived at the conclusion that the best strategy is to leave the Austin Center still standing, at least for now. They will rebrand the property Westshore City Center and pour more than $10 million into a major renovation — one that will modernize the building facades and common areas and create a sense of place on the campus, with pedestrian improvements, on-site restaurants and a large-scale mural.
The property will eventually be redeveloped, Wright said; it just won’t be for the foreseeable future.
For full story, visit https://www.bizjournals.com/tampabay/news/2019/12/13/austin-centers-big-makeover-comes-at-the-perfect.html
