The 36,535-sf Tides Building, at 331 Santa Monica Blvd., sold for $21.8 million in a transaction that was brokered by principal Bob Safai of Madison Partners. Donald Passman bought the building from Ten West Associates, which had acquired it a year ago in a deal that was also brokered by Madison Partners. The new buyers financed the acquisition with a conduit loan of $17.5 million that Madison Partners arranged.

Safai calls the building "ideally located," noting that the sale closed at an in-place capitalization rate of 5%, with retail rents at 50%-60% below market. The three-story concrete and steel structure stands on the corner of Fourth Street and Santa Monica Boulevard, three blocks north of the I-10 Freeway and a block from the city's Third Street Promenade.

The Tides Building is occupied by two retail tenants on the first floor, a spa on the second and six high-end, townhouse-style apartment units on the third story. When it traded last year, in a 1031 exchange deal, Madison Partners represented both the buyer and the seller of the building, which was completed in 2003.