Surprises of such magnitude are a little unusual, at least among buyers of major office complexes, says Bruce Palmer, senior vice president of construction management for Bloomington-based United Properties.United sees delving into everything from the windows and roof to the mechanical-electrical systems as part of the "due diligence" of buying a building, Palmer says.

While Palmer says he has not looked at the buildings on the Honeywell campus, he isn't surprised that Wells Fargo is spending what it is to renovatethe building, which is at least three decades old. Even in good condition, buyers can expect to pay $20 per sf to-$30 per sf to fix up space; add in asbestos and mechanical systems, and you can easily hit $70 per sf. TheHoneywell project will likely come close to hitting the high end of that range, given that only two of the three buildings are currently undergoing renovation.

Wells Fargo, which has renamed the campus "Wells Fargo Home Mortgage, Minneapolis Campus," will start moving its people to the campus this fall, and expects to have about 2,500 employees working there by the summerof next year. Davis likes the location of the campus and the factthat the mortgage operations can be centralized at one location. The mortgage company is consolidating its support operations from six different Twin Cities locations at the 29-acre site.