Case Study: American Coating Association achieves $1.6M premium sale and fully funded relocation with Cresa

Strategic real estate planning reveals sale and relocation as the preferred option

American Coating Association retained Cresa to prepare a Strategic Real Estate Plan and provide transaction and project management for its longtime Washington, DC headquarters. The Association owned a 19,500 rentable‑square‑foot building (occupied since 1939) but had outgrown the space and found the cost to retrofit the property to modern technological and operational standards prohibitively high, leading the board to favor selling and relocating.

Cresa evaluated potential purchasers, targeted the embassy community, and used direct marketing to generate competitive interest, ultimately selling the property for $1.6M above the required sale price. Cresa then identified relocation options and negotiated a transaction at 901 New York Avenue, NW that offset 100% of the build‑out, relocation, and new equipment/furniture costs, enabling the Association to upgrade facilities with no net capital outlay.

American Coating Association