PROVIDENCE – A six-story office building at 400 Westminster St. in downtown Providence recently sold for $3.5 million, according to public records.
Baltic Providence LLC sold the property at the corner of Westminster and Empire streets to PVD LLC, according to a record of the transaction that was filed with the city. Baltic Providence LLC owned the building since 2005, when it bought the property for $2.8 million.
Current tenants of the building include Providence Business News, New Harbor Group, the Law Offices of Kelly McKenna-Cournoyer, TM Business Solutions, Green and Spiegel LLC, and others. On the ground floor, there’s a convenience store on the Empire Street side of the building called University Mart.
Corporate filings at the R.I. Secretary of State’s Office show that PVD LLC was incorporated by local real estate investor and property manager Dustin Dezube.
“I think it’s a beautiful building that has a lot of charm,” said Dezube, who also recently bought the former Hotel Dolce Villa on Federal Hill. “Our plans are basically to maintain it as an office building. … It’s been kept up well by the prior owner. I like the tenants there, including Providence Business News. If there is a recovery in the office segment, I think it’s well positioned to benefit from that. Although, as you and I know, it’s never particularly been strong, and it’s been weakened by COVID.”
Dezube said he wants to see a retail tenant on the ground floor.
“We’re looking for potentially a restaurant concept,” he said.
The 41,000-square-foot brick office building was constructed on 0.2 acres of land in the early 1900s, according to records kept by the city assessor.
The building is known historically as the Caesar Misch Building, and it was designed by architectural firm Martin and Hall, according to an entry in the Archipedia maintained by the Society of Architectural Historians.
Marc Larocque is a PBN staff writer. Contact him at Larocque@PBN.com. You may also follow him on Twitter @LaRockPBN.
