The former Leisy Brewery property on Vega Avenue at Fulton Road at the southwest corner of Cleveland’s Ohio City neighborhood was envisioned as a residential redevelopment site by its current owner and others. But due to internal issues, the owner is selling the property only 18 months after buying it (Architecture, Design, & 3D Renderings by AODK Architecture). CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE THEM.
Joins neighboring for-sale Platform Brewery site
Only 18 months after buying the former Leisy Brewery property, 3400 Vega Ave. in Cleveland’s Ohio City neighborhood, an affiliate of Sanctus Capital LLC of Westlake has put the site back on the market again. It’s the second former brewery this year that was put up on the market in this part of town. Across Fulton Road, the closed Platform Brewery was put up for sale in May.
A source familiar with the real estate scene in that part of town said internal disagreements over Sanctus Capital’s vision resulted in the Leisy site being put back on the market. The source who spoke to NEOtrans on the condition of anonymity also expressed concern that the property would sit empty for a long time, although not for a lack of buyer interest.
The reason is the asking price. Realty agency The Sweda Group, based in the Lorain County community of Sheffield, listed the property for sale this week at $6.11 million. Listing the property was Kevin Kelly of Sanctus Capital. An e-mail sent by NEOtrans to Kelly seeking more information was opened but not answered prior to publication of this article.
Sanctus Capital bought the site for much less. According to public records, the real estate firm paid $750,000 cash for the property in May 2023 with a paper transfer in April to Sanctus affiliate 3400 Vega Avenue LLC. Also, the property was most recently appraised by Cuyahoga County for tax purposes at $632,500.
When Caraustar Recycling was still active in 2021 at 3400 Vega Ave. This is the only structure remaining from the old Leisy Brewing Co. on the east side of Fulton Road. Most of the rest of the large brewery was demolished in the 1970s. Another portion is behind the camera on the west side of Fulton (Google).
A prior owner acquired the property for $1.45 million in 1996, or nearly $3 million today based on a U.S. Labor Department inflation calculator. But real estate prices rose even faster in Cleveland over that same period — at least 135 percent, according to Clever Real Estate. On that score, a $1.45 million property in 1996 might be worth more than $3.5 million today.
“Located in Ohio City, the former historic Leisy Brewing Co. property is a unique opportunity in a city on the rise,” noted the property’s listing. “Spanning 5 acres, this site is positioned for adaptive reuse projects including mixed-use, multifamily, or commercial development. Situated near Downtown Cleveland, it offers prime access to the city’s thriving industrial and residential growth corridors.”
The listing goes on to point out that the site is located in an Opportunity Zone, thus offering tax benefits, and is eligible for an Ohio Brownfield Program grant. The property is zoned for industrial use, and plans are underway for commercial/multi-family rezoning, “making this a prime choice for forward-thinking developers,” the listing concludes.
The available land is very visible to passing motorists. it is located next to Interstate 90 with average daily traffic of 138,200 vehicles in 2023, according to the Ohio Department of Transportation.
Seen from Interstate 90, the 3400 Vega property is shown here with a sample multifamily development on the 5-acre site. Commercial uses could also find this highly visible site attractive (AODK Architecture).
Even before 3400 Vega was put back on the market, Sanctus Capital reportedly was getting interest in the site from prospective buyers, the source said. The source also noted that single-family homes in southern Ohio City, as well as the Clark-Fulton neighborhood, move very quickly, suggesting strong buyer interest in that area.
Across Fulton Road, the asking price for the 1-acre, former Platform Brewery property and its 100,000 square feet of early 20th-century buildings was not listed publicly. However it was appraised by Cuyahoga County at $510,000. Justin Carson of Cleveland owns Gypsy Real Estate Holding LLC which in turn owns the property, public records show.
The ex-Platform property was listed on real estate sites in May by brokerage CBRE. But it is no longer listed for sale or lease even though Cuyahoga County records do not show any sale or lease transactions were publicly recorded in recent years. NEOtrans sought more information to no avail from brokers at CBRE.
Platform was retrofitted in the 2010s with updated offices and modern production facilities for the microbrewer before it was acquired and closed by Anheuser-Busch in 2019. By comparison, the former Leisy land east of Fulton and its remaining 46,491-square-foot brewery structure built in 1890 were used most recently by Caraustar Recycling.
This and other maps of the for-sale property site, shown as “project site,” were included with the online real estate listing. This map shows the site’s existing and potential transportation access including by highway, streets, bus routes and stops, the Red Line rapid transit rail and the Red Line Greenway trail (The Sweda Group).
The ex-Platform Brewery structures were built as a bottling plant for the Leisy Brewing Co. Leisy was once Cleveland’s largest independent brewery. In 1864, German immigrant Frederick Haltnorth opened a small brewery that bore his name on Vega at Fulton.
it was acquired in 1873 by several brothers of the Leisy family, also originally from Germany. They began the Leisy Brewing Co. which closed in 1959 after Ohio raised taxes on beer production. The brewery was substantially demolished in the 1970s.
Investors have also occasionally eyed the nearby ScrapCom scrapyard, 3301 Monroe Ave. Four years ago, Cleveland-based apartment builder NRP Group reportedly was interested in the ScrapCom site for a mixed-income apartments development and even approached GCRTA about possibly adding an infill train station at Fulton.
GCRTA officials told NEOtrans they were receptive to the idea but then NRP cooled on starting new projects that were anything other than affordable housing in the Greater Cleveland market. From West 25th Street to West 65th Street is the longest section of the Airport-Downtown-Windermere Red Line without a station. There is also no access from Fulton or nearby streets to the Red Line Greenway trail along the rapid transit tracks.
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