John Hancock Center's Owners Default On Loan

By Soyoung Kwak in News on Feb 12, 2012 8:00PM

Unable to directly pay their loans, the owners of the John Hancock Center have called in a third party to help out with a $182 million dollar loan on the building. The owners of the $182 million dollar debt, including Chicago-based development and investment firm Golub & Co., have been in a financial showdown with its lenders for quite some time, and it doesn't look like the owners of the building will give up the control of the Hancock Center anytime soon.

Last Thursday, about $400 million dollars in loans were due on the building and just before the weekend, a trustee for the investors in the Hancock building transferred the $182 million dollar debt to Tri-Mont Real Estate Advisors, Inc. in Atlanta. Tri-Mont will not take over the debt, but will simply advise the owners on how to handle the debt:

TriMont will act as a special servicer, with the power to decide whether to file a foreclosure suit or restructure the debt. The rest of the debt is held by investors such as Blackstone Group L.P., NorthStar Realty Finance and Chicago-based John Buck Co., the Wall Street Journal has previously reported.

Crain's Chicago reports only 71 percent of the iconic 100-story building is occupied. Although it is too soon to tell what will happen to the ownership of the tower, it seems harder to guess how the owners will manage to pull out of their debt.