If Chicago's John Hancock Center gets a new owner, it could get a new name

Chicago-based developer Hearn Co. currently plans on selling the John Hancock Center's office space, parking garage and, perhaps most interestingly, its naming rights later this summer.1

Chicago-based developer Hearn Co. plans to put the North Michigan Avenue tower's office space and parking garage up for sale, possibly by late summer, company President and CEO Stephen Hearn said.

Hearn said he believes the real estate is worth more than $330 million, or more than double what his firm paid in 2013.

In addition to 897,000 square feet of office space and a 730-space parking garage, a buyer would acquire control of the naming rights at one of Chicago's most recognizable buildings.

John Hancock, the city's fourth-tallest building at 1,128 feet, has an unusual ownership structure in which residential condominiums, retail and restaurant space, the 360 Chicago observatory and broadcast antennas atop the tower are all owned separately.

Fog swirls around the John Hancock Center on July 2, 2015.
Fog swirls around the John Hancock Center on July 2, 2015. - The John Hancock Center is a Chicago icon, whose muscular, X-braced exterior made it an emblem of Chicago and influenced a generation of mega-skyscrapers, including the twin towers of New York’s World Trade Center, which were completed a few years later. © Antonio Perez, Chicago Tribune