Palo Alto office building fetches high price in wobbly Bay Area market

PALO ALTO — First Citizens Bank & Trust Co., which acquired the assets and deposits of failed Silicon Valley Bank, bought a downtown Palo Alto office building at a price that echoes back to a booming market before the COVID-19 outbreak.

At the corner of University Avenue and Ramona Street, the four-story 41,400-square-foot building was bought for $82 million, according to documents filed on Aug. 8 with the Santa Clara County Recorder’s Office. Florida-based Inspire Real Estate Holdings was the seller.

First Citizens Bank & Trust purchased the building at 250 Hamilton Ave. through a conventional grant deed transaction.

Inspire Real Estate bought it from Hewlett-Packard in 2003. The price wasn’t disclosed at the time.

The building, which is just a few blocks from a train station and Stanford University, also has ground-floor retail with tenants that include Salt & Straw.

The recent sales price equates to roughly $1,979 a square foot, a value level that was prevalent in Palo Alto and other high-demand office markets prior to the outbreak of the coronavirus.

Some examples of notable office building purchases in downtown Palo Alto prior to the COVID-19 outbreak include 192 Lytton Ave. for $23.1 million, or $2,551 a square foot; 530 Lytton Ave. for $117.5 million, or $2,156 a square foot; 150 Forest Ave. for $26 million, or $2,153 a square foot; and 385 Sherman Ave. for $138 million, or $2,030 a square foot.

In 2023, First Citizens Bank & Trust Co. bought $167 billion in total assets and $119 billion in total deposits that had been held by Silicon Valley Bank. It is now a division of First Citizens BancShares, which also owns First Citizens Bank.