"I think for Brookfield, they had a non-core property that they wanted to sell," Mike Winn with Cushman & Wakefield tells GlobeSt.com. Winn, along with fellow broker Tim Richey, represented Brookfield in the transaction. "And for the buyers, it was a chance to control a major CBD asset at a discount price." Transwestern and Broadreach are paying about $151 per sf. The replacement cost, Winn notes, would likely be $250 or more per sf.

Last year, a joint venture comprising Transwestern, Broadreach and locally based Equity West Investment Partners paid $77.65 million for the 43-story 1999 Broadway building. "Certainly, with 1999 Broadway and now the World Trade Center, they have some critical mass Downtown," Brad Neiman of Northstar Commercial Partners, which buys and sells commercial real estate on behalf and with private investors, tells GlobeSt.com. Neiman has been tracking the metro-area commercial real estate market for more than two decades.

"And if truly location is everything, you can't ask for a better site than the World Trade Center buildings, basically right at the 16th Street Mall, 17th Street and Broadway," Neiman says. Major tenants at the World Trade Center, which is more than 90% leased, include KeyBankNational Association, Noble Energy and WesternGeco.