Five months after a previous developer bowed out of a deal to buy the Dallas Morning News’ vacated campus in downtown Dallas, the newspaper has a new big-name investor ready to take it on.
Charter Holdings, owned by developer Ray Washburne, will buy the site at Young and Houston streets for $28 million from DMN-owner A.H. Belo, according to SEC paperwork filed late Friday afternoon. Taking into account interest paid over the next two years, the deal comes out to $31.6 million.
Washburne, who co-owns Highland Park Village and Mi Cocina-parent MCrowd Restaurant Group, also just bought a shopping center in West Dallas.
The DMN completed its move to Commerce Street inside the Statler in late 2017, after 68 years on Young. In late October of last year, the paper entered a deal with developers KDC and Mike Hoque, valued at $33 million for the 7.2 acres. But the deal never closed, and the paper said in December that KDC and Hoque Global were moving on.
The deal with Charter is done and closed, according to the SEC filing, with $5.6 million in cash changing hands today. It comes less than a month after a Belo shareholder took on an activist role, saying in a letter that it’s unhappy with the paper’s operations and suggesting that the company explore a sale.
