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In an email, a spokesperson for Nicola Wealth said the company is “not able to confirm the purchase of 2111 Main at this time.”
Developers have been sniffing around the City Centre site for decades, but the owner, Capital (Canada) Trading Company, held onto the 1954 motel, which it purchased for $2.8 million in September 1989.
The motel’s rates are still relatively low — $100 per night on several online booking sites. The City Centre supplements its motel income by renting the site as a film location — TV series like Batwoman, Once Upon a Time, Charmed and iZombie have filmed there.
Still, the property is worth far more as a development site — its 2021 property assessment is $36,958,000.
Oddly, the assessment is down 25 per cent from 2019, when it was assessed at $49,257,700. The 2021 property taxes were $382,183.09, down from $389,906.29 in 2019. (B.C. Assessment didn’t respond to a question about why the City Centre’s assessment went down so much.)
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The site is located in what the city calls the “Mount Pleasant industrial area,” which has an IC-2 zoning. A city spokesperson said that under existing zoning a new development could include “ manufacturing, storage, office, artist studio, retail (or) service.” If a new owner wanted to rezone the property, “ a mix of residential, office and retail uses are permitted, generally up to six storeys would be considered.”
According to its website, Nicola Wealth manages $11.2 billion in assets, including $6.4 billion worth of real estate. Its real estate portfolio is diverse, including condos, industrial buildings, offices and retail. The company has acquired $1 billion in real estate in the last 12 months, and expects to do over $1.5 billion in 2021.