Charter school planning to sell prime spot on edge of Back Bay

The Boston Renaissance Charter School is looking for a buyer for its building at the corner of Arlington and Stuart streets at the edge of the Back Bay, school officials and real estate executives said yesterday.

The 13-story, H-shaped building, built in 1927 as headquarters for Boston Consolidated Gas Co. and later used as the University of Massachusetts' Boston campus, is suitable for residences, offices, or perhaps most likely a new hotel, according to industry executives.

"We're chasing 100 Arlington, which is a great site for a hotel," said Dean F. Stratouly, president of the Congress Group, developer of the 33 Arch St. office tower. "The building has what I call good bones."

Developer interest in 100 Arlington is already "incredibly" strong even though a marketing package about the building is only now being sent to prospective buyers, said Bill Moylan, executive vice president and partner of CB Richard Ellis/New England. Moylan and Taylor Smith Realty of Boston are the brokers.

Moylan said developers have even expressed interest in using the building for residences, despite a softening housing market. The building's shape, with many windows, makes it desirable for hotel or housing, and its Park Square location, across from the Boston Park Plaza Hotel & Towers and near the theater district, is prime.

No price has been set. But one real estate executive, who asked not to be identified because he might bid on the building, predicted it would sell "in the high" $30 millions. Bids are due before the end of the year.

The building was renovated when UMass moved in the 1960s and again on four occasions to accommodate the charter school, the state's first .

"It's a valuable asset on their balance sheet," said Moylan. "The vertical campus downtown just doesn't work for what they are trying to do for the school."

The school is seeking a site in Boston to build a more compatible building -- shorter, with about half its 200,000 square feet -- that would have indoor and outdoor recreational areas.

Though it is selling into a hot real estate market, "I can't say we did this with any conscious sense of the market is moving," said Monroe "Bud" Moseley, chairman of Renaissance's board of trustees. "We did it to advance the educational experience of our students."

UMass bought the building for about $1.5 million in the mid-1960s. The state, which oversees charter schools, initially leased the building to the school in the mid-1990s and later provided favorable loans to buy and renovate it.

It's been something of a rocky road for the school, which opened with about 600 students in 1995 and now has more than 1,200 in kindergarten through sixth grade. The school separated in 2002 from its partner, Edison Schools Inc., a national manager of public and charter schools .

Chartered for up to grade 12, it began with K-8 but later scaled back to grade 6. Test scores have been below what the state Board of Education has wanted, and the school's charter this year was renewed with conditions, including a requirement that it reduce enrollment. A special review of the school will take place next year.

Tours for prospects begin next week.

The classical revival style building is of steel frame, with brick walls faced with light-colored limestone. It was designed by Parker, Thomas & Rice, an architectural firm that did other work in Boston, including the first of the three John Hancock buildings, 197 Clarendon St.

The charter school wants to lease space from the new owner until September 2008, when a new facility could be complete.

Thomas C. Palmer Jr. can be reached at tpalmer@globe.com.