A 410,000 sq ft office building in Liverpool known locally as ‘the Sandcastle’ has reportedly changed hands after being put on the market for £90m. Tony McDonough reports

Liverpool’s The Capital Building has changed hands for an undisclosed sum after being put on the market in 2023 for £90m.

Place North West reported on Monday that Oval Real Estate had acquired the site from Starwood Capital and was planning to immediately sell it on to institutional investor Legal & General.

Built in 1974, the Old Hall Street building is known locally as ‘the Sandcastle’ due to its distinctive design. It was originally constructed as the headquarters of insurance giant Royal Insurance which later became Royal & Sun Alliance.

Today, more than half the building is occupied by the UK Visas & Immigration department. It is understood that all of the space within the building is the subject of a government lease.

In 2006 the building was acquired by Liverpool property tycoon George Downing for £51m, then a record for the sale of a single office building in Liverpool. He spent a further £15m refurbishing its office space.

However, following the global financial crash The Capital ended up being controlled by US investment house Cerberus Capital Management as part of a debt portfolio sold by Lloyds Banking Group.

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Downing Group attended to negotiate the purchase of the 13-storey building from Cerberus but the two parties could not agree on a price and in 2013 Downing cut its losses and walked away.

Cerberus sold The Capital to Starwood and Trinity Investment Management in 2015 for £55m. Following a £26.2m refurbishment in 2021 Starwood instructed CBRE to find a buyer with a price tag of £90m.