COREAST BUILDING SOLD AT AUCTION

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, February 23, 1993                   TAG: 9302230203
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: LON WAGNER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium
COREAST BUILDING SOLD AT AUCTION
The seven-story former CorEast building in downtown Roanoke was sold Monday night for "slightly less than" $750,000.
The former CorEast Federal Savings Bank building was the showpiece of a 19-property auction conducted at the Airport Marriott by the Resolution Trust Co.
The RTC, formed by Congress in 1989 to sell off properties of failed savings and loans, recovered about $2 million during Monday night's auction.
Aubrey Nichols, the leader of a group calling itself Trip In Corp., began and ended the bidding for the CorEast building at $600,000.
But the building, constructed in 1958, was the only property of the night to have a minimum bid set for it.
After a few minutes of discussion, Nichols' group agreed to meet RTC's minimum price. Jim Striplin, general manager of J.P. King Auction Group, which conducted the auction for RTC, confirmed the minimum price was just under $750,000.
"It appears to be a first-class building, in a dynamite location," Striplin said. "I think by far it's the best buy of the night."
Nichols said the investors who bought the former CorEast building planned to renovate it and put the office space on the rental market.
Federal regulators seized CorEast, including 29 Virginia offices, in early 1991. In March 1992, the failed savings and loan was broken up and sold to 10 Virginia competitors for a total of $557 million.
Monday's auction drew a couple hundred people to the Airport Marriott. For sale were eight branch buildings of banks - in Roanoke, Salem, Staunton, Clifton Forge and Lynchburg - two other commercial properties and six condominiums at Snowshoe ski resort in West Virginia.
The one-bedroom condominiums, which attracted the interest of several audience members, required no minimum bid. They sold for $17,000 to $22,000.
Another bank branch in downtown Roanoke, the former Investors Savings Bank on Church Avenue, sold for $190,000.
A one-story CorEast branch in Staunton sold for $235,000.

by Archana Subramaniam by CNB