Slide show: Top 10 King County real estate deals in 2011 – Puget Sound Business Journal

Seattle-based Schnitzer West    LLC posted two of the top five real estate sales in King County in 2011, including the biggest deal of the year, the $350.5 million sale of the 1918 Eighth office building in Seattle.

The sale was part of a “two-fer.” Schnitzer West sold both the 1918 Eighth building and the 818 Stewart Street office office tower to JP Morgan Asset Management of Los Angeles in August of last year. With 818 Stewart fetching $129.3 million, Schnitzer pocketed a total of $479.8 million on the sale of the two office buildings. The transactions ranked No. 1 and No. 5 on the Puget Sound Business Journal’s list of King County Real Estate Deals for 2011.

These sales and other transactions that made the list reflect an improving economy and increased appetite for real estate among institutional investors last year. The New York research firm Real Capital Analytics    reported that big sales of commercial properties in the U.S. in 2011 were up 57 percent compared with the prior year.

The Puget Sound region ranked 14th in the nation in 2011 with $4.94 billion in commercial property sales, according to Real Capital Analytics.

Four of the top five transactions last year were sales of large office buildings.

JEANNE LANG JONES covers commercial real estate for the Puget Sound Business Journal. Phone: 206-876-5426 | Email: jlj@bizjournals.com Click here to sign up for the PSBJ Daily Update.

via Slide show: Top 10 King County real estate deals in 2011 – Puget Sound Business Journal.