CHICAGO—The Chicago office market continues to prove quite attractive to out-of-town investors, including many from overseas. GLL Real Estate Partners, a Munich-based firm, has just completed the purchase of One11 West Illinois, a class A mixed-use office and retail building in River North, the city's most popular office submarket. The seller was the Chicago-based Alter Group, which developed the building in 2008. Its affiliate, Alter Asset Management, will continue on as property manager for GLL.

“One11 West Illinois is a very efficient building, built to the highest standards by a quality developer to provide modern, collaborative space solutions in one of Chicago's most desirable neighborhoods,” says Christian Goebel of GLL. “We like the location, the building and the quality of the tenants and believe this is an excellent addition to our portfolio in North America.”

“We had interest from Middle Eastern, German, Chinese, South Korean, Swiss, Israeli and Canadian investors—including sovereign wealth, pension funds, reinsurance companies, high-net-worth families—and also domestic pension funds, insurance companies, net lease REITs and investment funds,” says James Clark, managing principal of EnTrust Realty Advisors LLC, which represented Alter. “Ultimately, we selected GLL based on their thorough underwriting of the asset; their understanding of the vertical subdivision ownership structure; their appreciation of the value of retaining Alter as property manager; and of course their recognition of the unique value of this property as one of the few mid-size Class A office properties in River North.”