The Cherry Creek corner that is home to Italian restaurant Cucina Colore has sold, although the buyer has no immediate plans to redevelop it.
“We’ll probably just land bank it for the time being,” said Kevin Beck.
Beck and his wife, acting as Phenomena LLC, paid $9.85 million on Friday for the northwest corner of Third Avenue and St. Paul Street, according to public records.
The building at 3035-3041 E. Third Ave. is about 7,000 square feet and leased to four tenants. Cucina Colore has operated there since 1994 and has multiple years left on its lease, Beck said. The deal also included the parking lot behind the buildings.
The entire site is 0.43 acre, meaning the deal works out to $525 a square foot based on the land. It’s zoned for up to four stories. For comparison, the same-sized Cherry Creek Dance lot four blocks west sold for $7.8 million in April.
“We just think it’s a good long-term investment,” Beck said. “We think there’s a redevelopment opportunity over time.”
Beck, 54, is an executive with Paradice Investment Management, an investment firm that operates in Cherry Creek in a building he and his wife also own. The couple live nearby. Paradice was not involved in last week’s purchase.
The properties were sold by Beall Group LLC and Green City LLC, which had owned them for decades. Mary Beall signed on behalf of both entities.
Large sites remain in demand in Cherry Creek, where office and apartment projects have continued to break ground despite the rise of remote work and high interest rates and construction costs.
“It’s one of the only markets in the country where projects still pencil,” said real estate broker Phil Ruschmeyer of Ruschmeyer Corp., who represented another party that pursued the site
Denver received a concept plan back in 2023 that proposed a four-story office building at the site. Beck wasn’t involved with that proposal.
“I think a lot of people have looked at the site over the years,” Beck said.
This story was originally published by BusinessDen.
Get more business news by signing up for our Economy Now newsletter.