Looking ahead to 2013, the firm is continually reviewing properties that could be opportunities for purchase or sale, says the spokesperson. “We actively monitor the commercial real estate markets and our portfolios to capitalize on opportunities that could enhance overall credit quality, strengthen yield characteristics and further diversify across tenancy concentrations, industry or geography,” the spokesperson says.

With this transaction, the spokesperson adds, Cole has closed approximately $540 million of dispositions this year and is currently marketing other opportunities.

Constructed in 2008, the office tower, home to Microsoft’s Bing division, is LEED Gold certified. Microsoft has made a significant investment above the landlord’s tenant improvement allowance of $43 million to upgrade the facility “to meet the needs of a high-technology, mission critical, ‘headquarters quality’ asset,” according to a prepared statement.

The buyer, CommonWealth Partners is a privately held, vertically integrated real estate investment, development and management firm. CWP has been active in the Seattle market, as its recent acquisition of Russell Investments Center was added to a portfolio that also includes Safeco Plaza.

As GlobeSt.com previously reported in April of this year, CommonWealth acting on behalf of CalPERS, agreed to buy the 42-story Russell Investments Center downtown for $480 million. Northwestern Mutual, the finance firm based in Milwaukee, was the seller. At the time of the sale, CommonWealth partner Rick Lewis said that the firm was adding to its Seattle holdings. “These investments are well-positioned to benefit from the continued momentum in the leasing market,” he said in April. Lewis said his firm has more than $5 billion to invest across major US markets in the next several years.

Hamid Panahi, sales manager of Marcus & Millichap’s Seattle office, tells GlobeSt.com that Washington State is on pace to add more than 60,000 jobs in 2012, and the Seattle area is the economic engine for Washington; therefore it will be the primary beneficiary of this growth. “It is also projected that the office submarkets in downtown Seattle and downtown Bellevue will reach single-digit vacancies by the end of 2013, the first time since year-end 2008.”

Spurring improvements in the office sector among other things include: Further leasing demand from a growing high-tech, software, and on-line gaming industry spurred by a return in venture capital in the region; and growth in hospitality and tourism is resulting in a wave a new job growth and helping improve occupancies in office.

“Should Seattle remain on this present course of consistent, moderate growth, look for developers to dust of their plans for new projects in the coming year to meet the increasing demands for both build-to-suit projects and some speculative projects in the downtown CBD’s,” Panahi says.

Although GlobeSt.com couldn’t reach CommonWealth to discuss this particular purchase, a recent office report from Jones Lang LaSalle, also shows positives in the local office market. “Top tier, downtown class A office buildings continue to outperform, although their success comes at the expense of commodity class A, class B and suburban properties,” says a recent report from the firm.

JLL research director, Patricia Raicht, says that “While market-wide average asking rental rates have not moved significantly for over two years, they are now inching up.” What’s more, she says, larger increases continue to be observed in buildings with occupancy rates of 90% or higher. In the meantime, “leasing fundamentals continue to slowly shift as market demand increases and landlords are pulling back on concession packages.”