Firm sells, leases back landmark R.I. building

PROVIDENCE, R.I. – A Chicago-area real estate investment company has paid $21.3 million for a downtown Providence landmark known as the Superman building, and has agreed to lease it back to FleetBoston Financial Corp. for 10 years.

While it leases, FleetBoston will retain control of the building, where it employs about 750. FleetBoston owned the building for 75 years and occupied all 26 stories for about 10 years.

Joe Cosenza, chairman of Inland Real Estate Acquisitions, said the building is an investment.

“This building, without having anything done with it, it reaps the benefits of all of the other things around it, like the commuter station across the street. Like all of the restaurants,” Cosenza told The Providence Journal.

By selling the Superman building, FleetBoston not only frees up capital, it also eliminates a nonearning asset, since the building was not generating revenue in the form of lease payments.

Both FleetBoston and Inland declined to specify the price of the lease.