Property's fate unclear despite $4 million sale
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Web Posted: 07/20/2006 12:12 AM CDT
Rachel Stone
Express-News Business Writer
A San Antonio developer intends to pay $4 million for a few acres of land just south of Olmos Park, even though deed restrictions prohibit building on it.
And in a strange twist, whether those deed restrictions are released is up to one of the losing bidders.
Koontz McCombs was the winning bidder on the 2.7 acres that the San Antonio Independent School District auctioned off this week. The land is near Trinity University and Incarnate Word High School.
Koontz McCombs' bid was twice that of Trinity University, which owned the property until 61 years ago and which put the deed restriction in place.
The sale is expected to close next month. A spokesman for Koontz McCombs wouldn't hint at the company's plans for the land or how it might get around the stifling deed.
But at $33.82 per square foot, this isn't just any old patch of scrub.
Wedged between Hildebrand Avenue and Devine Road, and seconds from U.S. 281, it's a hilltop with high-dollar possibilities.
"I don't know what you'd do on land that expensive. It would have to be high-density office or condominiums," said Jim Lundblad, a broker with REOC Partners Ltd., a San Antonio real estate company.
"On the surface, it sounds expensive, but it's such a great location. They're not making any more land over there."
Its convoluted history may be a roadblock, however.
In 1945, Trinity University sold it to the city for $10,000 as part of the Hildebrand Avenue expansion, but retained some control over it.
As a condition of the sale, the board stipulated that the city could use it only for a park or a parking lot, and that no structure could be built there.
The city donated the site to the SAISD in 1968, and it's been used mostly as overflow parking for Alamo Stadium since then. Restrictions from the 1945 deal remain in place.
Trinity would have to release the deed restrictions before Koontz McCombs, the company behind a plan to build high-rise condominiums on the old Earl Abel's restaurant site, could build on it.
Considering Trinity had a losing bid of $2 million, however, who knows how likely that will be.
Trinity's board of trustees hasn't discussed whether to release the deed restrictions, spokeswoman Sharon Jones Schweitzer said.
"We have concerns about what it might be used for," she said.
The university didn't have specific plans for the property, but the Monte Vista Historic District, Hildebrand Avenue and Alamo Stadium create developmental barriers for the campus.
"I guess you could say we're landlocked," Schweitzer said.
The University of the Incarnate Word, which is building a new pharmacy school just across Devine Road, also lost in the auction with a bid of $2.25 million.
Several developers had approached the district about the land, which prompted the auction, said Kamal ElHabr, the school district's associate superintendent for facilities services.
"It's a very nice location overlooking downtown," he said.
"We were pretty excited. Four million dollars is pretty hefty, even for that property."