Sarasota investor Biter buys two Main Street buildings


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  • | 9:13 a.m. January 17, 2013
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BUYER: Downtown Project LLC (principal: Jesse Biter), Sarasota
SELLER: Suzanne Krill
PROPERTY: 1560 Main St., Sarasota
PRICE: $2.08 million

BUYER: LanHole LLC (principal: Jesse Biter), Sarasota
SELLER: 1564 Main Street LLC
PROPERTY: 1564 Main St., Sarasota
PRICE: $2 million
PREVIOUS PRICE: $483,400, March 2004
LAW FIRM ON DEED: Berlin-Patten PLLC, Sarasota

PLANS, DESCRIPTION:
Sarasota businessman Jesse Biter purchased two buildings covering a total of 17,854 square feet on Main Street for $4.08 million.

The price equated to $228 per square foot.

The buildings feature 200 feet and eight storefronts along Main Street. Tenants include The Bullet Hole, Pho Cali, the Drunken Poet and Pangea Lounge.

Biter plans to meet with city planners to discuss possible development options on the site. For now, he wants to keep the two buildings' current tenants in place.

Biter is also looking to acquire other properties downtown and in the Rosemary District. The entrepreneur said downtown needs residential units working professionals can afford. He is also looking for development land.

“We are looking at a few [parcels] that fit my vision for what Sarasota should be,” Biter says. “There will be some purchases in 2013.”

The Main Street buildings mark the third major downtown property investment in the last two years for Biter, an entrepreneur who sold his $16 million auto sales software firm in 2010.

In December 2011, Biter entered into an agreement with the city of Sarasota to buy the 11,000-square-foot retail space on the ground floor of the Palm Avenue parking garage for $1.6 million.

Biter was also involved in plans to move the HuB, a for-profit business incubator, to its new headquarters at the site of the former Century Bank on Fruitville Road and Goodrich Avenue. He purchased that building in May 2011 for $2.8 million.

Steve Horn and Ian Black of Ian Black Real Estate and Lee DeLeito Jr. of Michael Saunders & Co. handled the transactions.

— reporting by Roger Drouin, correspondent

 

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