Pacific Office Properties considering shutdown

A local company that owns three Honolulu office tower properties lost more money in the first quarter and let investors know its board is considering alternatives that could include dissolution.

Pacific Office Properties Trust Inc. said in a financial report published Tuesday that its net loss about doubled to $3.9 million in the January-March period from $1.8 million in the same quarter last year.

The primary reason was $1.9 million that Pacific Office received in last year’s first quarter from selling a Waikiki building it owned with partners.

Revenue from routine operations in the recent quarter was $8.9 million, down from $9.3 million a year earlier while expenses were flat at about $12 million.

Pacific Office owns three buildings in Honolulu — the Pan Am Building, Waterfront Plaza and Davies Pacific Center — and a 5 percent stake in an Arizona property.

The collection is expected to be reduced in August with the planned sale of the Pan Am Building, which Pacific Office arranged to sell in 2016 to Don Quijote (USA) Co. as part of a deal where Don Quijote also loaned Pacific Office $280 million to avoid a default on maturing debt.

Pacific Office projects that it won’t have enough cash flow from operations and cash on hand to sustain business beyond the third quarter.

In recent years, Pacific Office has generated cash by selling properties and borrowing money from related parties.

The company has previously cautioned investors about its ability to continue and warned that it may consider strategic alternatives such as a sale or merger as well as other ways to raise capital.

In its latest financial report, Pacific Office added that current considerations include dissolving the company.

“Because we have not identified, and we do not believe we will identify, a course of action to achieve profitability in the foreseeable future, our board of directors is currently considering alternatives for the future of the company, including the sale of our remaining assets and/or dissolution of the company,” Pacific Office said in the report. “We may also consider other strategic alternatives, including a sale, merger, other business combination or recapitalization of the company.”

Pacific Office was created as a publicly traded firm in 2008 by local real estate investor Jay Shidler, who contributed several buildings he owned. The company at one point owned 24 properties and had aspirations of using investor capital to acquire many more. Instead, Pacific Office struggled amid the U.S. economic recession shortly after the company’s formation and ended up selling or losing properties to foreclosure in an effort to stay solvent.

Since inception, Pacific Office’s cumulative net loss was $260.6 million through March.

Shares of stock in the company closed Wednesday at 11 cents, unchanged from Tuesday. Shares over the last 52 weeks have closed between 5 cents on Sept. 7 and 19 cents on Nov. 27.