Beacon Capital and pension co-investor CalSTRS are shopping the 25-story tower on Jackson Square at roughly $150 million — under the $191.5 million they paid in 2019, a rare below-basis mark with a public pension along for the ride.

Seven years ago Beacon Capital Partners paid $191.5 million for the Class A tower at 655 Montgomery Street, The Registry reported (external source, opens in a new tab). The Boston firm is now trying to sell it for less. Pricing guidance on the 25-story building sits at roughly $150 million, Hoodline reported (external source, opens in a new tab) from JLL's offering materials — about $41.5 million under what Beacon paid, and that gap widens before you count the roughly $15 million it later spent on improvements, a figure The Real Deal (external source, opens in a new tab) reported and Hoodline relayed.

Selling below your own basis is the tell. This is not a landlord cashing out a gain in a recovering market; it's an owner marking down a 2019 bet.

The 273,272-square-foot tower, also known as Montgomery Washington Tower, sits on the Jackson Square edge of downtown, directly across from the Transamerica Pyramid. Beacon has hired JLL to run the sale, and The Registry reports the building is 87 percent leased. It was built in 1984 and renovated in 2023; per JLL's marketing as summarized by Hoodline, the commercial floors carry a tenant lounge, a fitness center, a conference center and a yoga studio. No hard asking price has been set and Beacon hasn't said why it's exiting, so $150 million is guidance, not a deal.

On the square footage now being marketed, that guidance works out to about $550 a foot, down from roughly $700 in 2019 measured against the same area. (The Real Deal put the 2019 figure at $728 a foot, calculated on a smaller measured area.)

The markdown isn't Beacon's alone. It brought the California State Teachers' Retirement System in as a co-investor on the original purchase, Institutional Real Estate, Inc. reported (external source, opens in a new tab) — so a public pension eats a share of the difference. CalSTRS's real estate holdings are still, in the fund's own framing this month relayed by The Registry, "regrouping." Trades like this one are the regrouping.

Priced at $550 a foot, though, Beacon isn't asking for distress money. The Real Deal pegged the citywide office average near $310 a foot in early 2025, while the trophy Transamerica complex across the street changed hands around $922. Beacon wants to be read as solid, well-leased Class A. The bids will decide whether it prints there — and how large a check CalSTRS ends up writing against its stake.