On the 89th floor of the St. Regis Chicago sits a 6,000-square-foot condo that has never sold on its own. It was listed in 2019 for $11 million and pulled from the sale market in 2020. For much of 2025 it was offered for rent at $35,000 a month, and that rental listing came down in November. A month later it changed hands. According to The Real Deal, Dalian Wanda Group transferred it and 15 other units to a Sony Pictures Entertainment subsidiary. The transfer was a non-cash asset swap that settled a dispute over the rights to the children's show "Octonauts."
The story is unusual, but the pattern is now normal in Lakeshore East. The newest condos in the neighborhood are mostly held by firms that bought them in bulk, and no announced condo tower is in the pipeline to compete with them. For anyone comparing downtown neighborhoods, that changes who sits across the table and what a fair offer looks like.
The only active tower site is planned as apartments
Lakeshore East is Magellan Development Group's master-planned district on a 28-acre former golf course just east of the Loop, begun in 2002. Its newest buildings are already a few years old. Lendlease lists Cirrus, with 350 condominiums, as opening in spring 2022, and Cascade, with 503 rental apartments, as opening in summer 2021.
Three pieces of the master plan are still in motion.
- Parcel O, 193 N. Columbus Drive. CoStar reported in February 2026 that the site is zoned for up to 574 apartments, 239 hotel rooms and more than 10,000 square feet of retail. The plan has no condos. In 2025, Chicago YIMBY described it as a 47-story tower anchored by a Hoxton hotel. The site had city approval and caisson permits, but construction had stalled while the developers looked for funding.
- The ownership stake behind Parcel O. In February 2026, CBRE was marketing Hanwha Engineering & Construction's stake in Parcel O and in the adjacent Village Market retail at 333 E. Benton Place, which is anchored by Mariano's. Magellan CEO David Carlins told CoStar that a new partner would not change the plan for a large mixed-use tower.
- Phase 2. Lendlease's project page says Phase I is complete and Phase 2, a high-rise residential tower, is in pre-development. It gives no unit count, start date, or answer on whether the units will be condos or rentals.
Until Phase 2 has a schedule and a tenure, every Lakeshore East condo a buyer can plan around already exists. Even if Parcel O breaks ground soon, it would add renters and hotel guests to the neighborhood without adding a single unit to the for-sale market.
Who holds the unsold St. Regis condos now
When a developer is selling out a new tower, buyers usually negotiate with a sales office that is watching its absorption pace and loan terms. At the St. Regis, most of that developer-held inventory has already been sold off in blocks.
| When | Seller | Buyer | Units | Reported price | Per unit |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| November 2024 | Magellan Development | GD Holdings, Denver | 84 | $117 million | almost $1.4 million |
| December 2025 | Dalian Wanda Group | Sony Pictures Entertainment subsidiary | 16 of Wanda's 37 | about $47.5 million, via asset swap | nearly $3 million, including the 89th-floor unit |
| May 2026 | Not stated in the accessible text | GD Holdings | 16 | $21 million | about $1.3 million |
The Magellan sale came after a slow sellout. The Real Deal reported that in 2023 Magellan took out a $150 million loan against unsold units, and that the building logged 26 individual sales in 2024. The Sony transfer covered 16 of the 37 condos Wanda had marketed in bulk. In May 2026, Crain's Chicago Business reported that GD Holdings bought another 16 St. Regis condos for $21 million in its second bulk purchase at the building.
The resale record shows how these holders operate. GD Holdings has been reselling units one at a time and getting high prices for the best ones. A 79th-floor penthouse sold for $7.5 million in September 2025, and an 84th-floor penthouse sold for $9.25 million in October, according to The Real Deal.
What a bulk buyer's cost basis means for your offer
This is where the friction shows up in a transaction. An investor who paid an average of about $1.3 million to $1.4 million per unit across a portfolio is pricing each condo against two things: what it paid for the whole block and what the best units in that block have already brought. The penthouses that sold for $7.5 million and $9.25 million help cover the cost of the smaller units. As a result, the floor-plan-and-view premium within a single building can be wider than a buyer used to developer price sheets expects.
It also means sellers can differ sharply in the same building. A unit held by GD Holdings, one held by the Sony subsidiary and one owned by a longtime resident can sit on adjacent floors with completely different reasons to sell and different deadlines. The Sony subsidiary's plans for its units were unclear when The Real Deal reported the deal in January 2026. Checking county records to find out who owns a specific unit, and when and how they bought it, is basic preparation for an offer at the St. Regis.
Bulk sales also affect how a building is perceived. David Wolf, CEO of Wolf Development Strategies, told The Real Deal that bulk sales can raise concerns about a building's financial health. He added that they don't always signal deeper distress, since many of the remaining St. Regis units were pricier and harder to sell when luxury buyers were looking at lower price points. The individual sales since then, including some of the highest downtown prices of 2025, support that second reading.
Cirrus is the other source of newer units, and it is thinning out
If the St. Regis is where newer inventory has moved into investor hands, Cirrus at 211 N. Harbor Drive is where it is being used up. Jameson Sotheby's International Realty, Lesley Sweeney's Chicago brokerage, took over the Cirrus listings in 2024. Its development team's figures, reported by The Real Deal in July 2026, track the change.
- First half of 2023: 13 units sold
- First half of 2025: 24 units sold
- First half of 2026: 46 closed and 15 under contract, 61 in all
Units averaged $1.24 million in 2026 sales through mid-July, at roughly $800 to $1,000 per square foot depending on size and layout. The top sales ran from $2.4 million to $2.9 million in May and July, and east-facing penthouses sold at a premium. Sarah Rodriguez, vice president for development at Jameson Sotheby's, said in the same report, "I wish we had a lot more inventory to sell now." The buyers she described were mostly older professionals downsizing, along with some looking for a second home near family.
Cirrus has 350 condos in total. A building of that size cannot keep adding 61 sales and contracts every six months for long before the remaining stock and the resale stock are the same thing.
Why older towers are getting a second look
When the newest building sells down and nothing new has been announced, demand moves to the existing towers. A downtown luxury agent told The Real Deal in July that buyers have become "willing to do the work now. They're buying units and they're redoing them. And they might not have looked that way if there was newer inventory."
In Lakeshore East, that is how scarcity works its way through the market. A unit with a dated kitchen in an older building near the park, priced against a thinning Cirrus and an investor-priced St. Regis, becomes a renovation candidate. In a neighborhood with a steady supply of new construction, it would just be a compromise. For a buyer, comparing a finished Cirrus unit with an older unit plus a renovation budget is now a real side-by-side choice. That comparison becomes more relevant every quarter Phase 2 stays in pre-development.
The citywide numbers point the same way. In August 2026, Illinois REALTORS counted 699 condo sales in the City of Chicago, down 1.4% from August 2025. The median condo price was $369,950, up 8.2% year over year. Total listings across all property types were 3,541 that month, 23.3% fewer than a year earlier, and homes took a median 26 days to sell, unchanged from August 2025. Fewer sales at higher prices with less inventory is what a supply squeeze looks like. Those are citywide figures that don't break out Lakeshore East separately. Even so, in a neighborhood with no announced condo tower in its pipeline, the pressure is stronger than the citywide numbers suggest.
Questions buyers ask
Will Parcel O add condos to the neighborhood? Not under the current plan. CoStar's February 2026 reporting describes up to 574 apartments, 239 hotel rooms and ground-floor retail. It would add residents, but none of the units would be for sale.
Does buying from a bulk holder differ from buying from a resident owner? The seller's math is different. A bulk holder prices each unit as part of a portfolio, and the strong penthouse sales at the St. Regis show these holders are willing to wait for their price on the best units.
Is Phase 2 a reason to wait? Lendlease lists it as pre-development, with no published unit count, start date or tenure. A buyer can't plan around supply that has no schedule.
If you're weighing a Cirrus unit, a St. Regis unit held by an investor, or an older condo near Lakeshore East Park that needs work, the right comparison depends on who owns each unit and what they paid. Lesley Sweeney can pull the ownership and sale history behind the units on your shortlist before you write an offer. Schedule your complimentary market consultation.
