Downtown Raleigh’s Sir Walter Apartments up for sale

Sir Walter, the downtown Raleigh senior housing complex on Fayetteville Street, is being marketed to investors for possible redevelopment.

The sales price for the 140-unit complex is $16.8 million, according to a flier put out by commercial real estate firm NAI Carolantic Realty.

The building is 100 percent occupied. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development subsidizes the rent of Sir Walter’s occupants, and the contract between HUD and the owner runs through August 2020.

That means the tenants are at least guaranteed to be able to remain in place until that date should a sale take place, said Mona Williams, regional property manager for Residential Properties Management, which manages the Sir Walter.

She said RPM hasn’t notified the residents about a possible sale.

“They’re seniors and we don’t want to frighten them because they’re good until 2020,” she said.

If the property is sold, and the new owner chooses not to extend the HUD contract, tenants would be given a year’s notice before they had to leave, Williams said.

A surge in redevelopment activity in downtown Raleigh has led a number of long-time property owners to explore selling their holdings. The NAI Carolantic flier notes that the Sir Walter, just a short walk from City Plaza and the Convention Center, would be excellent for redevelopment into a hotel, apartments or offices.

Bill Benton, one of Sir Walter’s owners, declined to comment this week on the potential sale of the property. His group paid $850,000 for the 190,518-square-foot building in 1978. Benton is chairman and CEO of Salem Senior Housing, a Winston-Salem company.

Built in 1923, the Sir Walter is on the National Register of Historic Places. It was once one of the state’s finest hotels.

Presidents Harry Truman and Lyndon Johnson stayed at the hotel and each year, the daughters of the state’s elite would gather in the ballroom for the annual debutante ball. Legions of legislators lived there part time because it was near the Capitol, which had no office space.

The hotel fell out of favor with lawmakers when the new Legislative Building on Jones Street opened in 1962. The new building had legislative offices and was farther from the Sir Walter. Other hotels opened on Hillsborough Street to attract legislators.

When Benton bought the hotel and converted it into low-income housing for the elderly, it had been vacant for several years.

This story was originally published April 22, 2016 at 11:45 AM with the headline "Downtown Raleigh’s Sir Walter Apartments up for sale."