Huntington Bank office building in downtown Canton to be auctioned, again

CANTON ‒ The 12-story downtown Huntington Bank office building is available at auction — again.

A previous auction in late February didn't produce a buyer, when the minimum starting bid was $2.15 million. This time around, the minimum bid was reduced to $850,000 in the online auction, which opens at noon Sept. 18 and concludes two days later.

Representatives from Friedman Real Estate, the broker, and Ten-X, the auction site, did not return phone calls seeking comment for this story.

The 36-year-old building and its 488-space parking deck, attached by a walkway over the 200 block of Market Avenue S, isn't actually owned by Huntington Bank, though it maintains some operations there.

The property owner is Amerimar, a Philadelphia company, though the site has traditionally been named for its bank tenants through the years, including United and Unizan, prior to Huntington.

Amerimar had paid $8.9 million for the property in 2013.

Pandemic, then foreclosure

Last year, after several missed mortgage payments, lender Deutsche Bank Trust Co., filed for and was granted foreclosure in Stark County Common Pleas Court ― records show Amerimar still owed $8.1 million.

Amerimar partner Stephen Marshall said he's not sure he can add anything to what he told the Canton Repository prior to the first auction: That he believes the Huntington plaza was the finest office building in the city when they bought it 10 years ago, and still is today.

"However, we could not profitably manage the property through the disruptions of the pandemic," Marshall had stated. "We hope that the next owner will make the most out of the foremost office tower of downtown Canton."

Situated on a city block between the renovated Hilton hotel and Central Plaza S, the Huntington building has 132,000 square feet of office space. An NAI Spring listing for available leases inside the building indicates it's only about 50% occupied.

"That building has a lot of different shapes and sizes available," Dan Spring, president of NAI Spring, said earlier this year. "And I think office (rentals) are going to come back better than they have."

Office space open everywhere

The Ten-X website touts, "Market rates continue to increase in Canton, allowing for dramatic revenue growth through vacancy lease-ups."

The property is among those across the country, which were peppered with tenants leaving — opting either for smaller confines or for a workforce that can work from home.

Jones Lang LaSalle, a global real estate services company in Chicago, recently reported more than 20% of the office space in the U.S. remains vacant. JLL noted that buildings constructed in the 1980s and 1990s have been particularly hard hit.

The Huntington building and parking deck are valued at a combined $7.7 million, according to a Stark County auditor appraisal.

The site is located within one of the city's Opportunity Zones. Those designated low-income, high-poverty census tracts can provide developers mechanisms for possible tax breaks.

Reach Tim at 330-580-8333 ortim.botos@cantonrep.com.On Twitter: @tbotosREP

This article originally appeared on The Repository: Huntington Bank building, one of Canton's tallest, to be auctioned