So you have a large commercial property for sale and there are no buyers. What are you to do?

You know the credit markets are still frozen, and corporations are skittish in giving up any capital in the face of a recession, right? So what buyers are left.

Call your local college or university. They have ready cash in endowments, or able to raise money through bond sales if they are public schools, and looking at the recent federal budget, still flush with money.

Colleges and Universities may be your best bet to sell your large commercial building.

Pete Culliney, director of research for Real Capital, says some schools have taken advantage of the downturn to buy properties, particularly apartments, while many skittish or cash-poor investors remain on the sidelines. Among the larger recent buys by schools: The Regents of the University of California, the governing body for the 10-campus University of California system, paid $53 million in February for a 211,000-square-foot office building in Berkeley, Calif., to use partly for adult and continuing-education classes. The Lone Star purchase was driven in part by the growing demand for its affordable higher education. The publicly supported college system has seen its enrollment climb nearly 40% in the past five years.

The college also was able to do the deal because it wasn’t forced to tap today’s largely frozen credit markets, which many traditional buyers must use. Rather, Lone Star used proceeds from a $420 million bond referendum for expansion efforts that was passed last year by voters in the area it serves. Lone Star expects to spend about $12 million renovating the facility and ultimately plans to use about 40% of the space for educational purposes, including subleasing some of the space to several universities in the area. Lone Star intends to lease the remainder of the space to outside companies. via  WSJ.com.

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