Washington State University has selected Spokane-based commercial real estate broker NAI Black to market and sell the former Jensen-Byrd Building and underlying land in the University District east of downtown.

NAI Black has listed the overall property at 131 E. Main for sale for $2.95 million. Jeff McGougan and Mark McLees, both of NAI Black, are the listing agents.

The six-story building with a basement and attached two-story addition has a total of 171,000 square feet of floor space. The listing includes a separate single-story metal warehouse building on the property that has 6,000 square feet of floor space. It also includes about 58,000 square feet, or roughly 1.3 acres, of land.

The original building was constructed in 1909 and has 19,600 square feet of space on each floor, and the addition has 17,000 square feet perfloor.

The designated land use is downtown university, which allows for office, retail, residential, and limited industrial use, McGougan says.

"The building could be used for condominiums, and it could have a combination of office and retail use on the ground floor," he says.

WSU decided to sell the property following two failed attempts to develop it through public-private partnerships.

"It's going to be a challenge, and it will take someone with some horsepower to take it on," McGougan says of the listing.

An arm of the nonprofit WSU Foundation bought the former Jensen-Byrd building and other properties near it a decade ago and later transferred ownership to the university.

Jensen-Byrd Co., a Spokane hardware distributor now doing business as Jensen Distribution Services, moved the last of its operations from that building to its main facility on the West Plains in 2004, and the University District property has been vacant since then.

NAI Black is aligned with NAI Global, a network of 325 independent commercial real estate offices in 55 countries.

Separately, a New York real estate company, C-III Capital Partners LLC, recently agreed to buy NAI Global in a deal that's expected to be completed in September.

Jeff Johnson, a principal with NAI Black, says NAI Black will continue to operate under its current business name, but that the deal ultimately could increase national and international exposure for NAI Black's listings, including the former Jensen-Byrd property. The terms of that transaction weren't disclosed.

"C-III Capital has incredible relationships with commercial lenders all over the U.S., and that will enhance our relationships with lenders," Johnson says.

Andrew Farkas, who heads C-III Capital, also has relationships with large global companies, Johnson says, adding, "It think that will increase NAI's work with Fortune 500 companies."