Former Hudson's Bay building in downtown Vancouver listed for sale | Daily Hive

Former Hudson's Bay flagship store building in downtown Vancouver. (Kenneth Chan)

One of the most historically significant and largest retail properties formerly owned by the now-dismantled Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) has been listed for sale.

A joint partnership between commercial real estate firms CBRE Limited and Marcus & Millichap has been appointed to market and oversee the sale of the former Hudson’s Bay flagship department store building, located at 674 Granville St. in downtown Vancouver.

In an announcement today, it is stated that the property is now being listed on behalf of FTI Consulting Canada, which is acting as the court-appointed receiver.

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“This is an extraordinary opportunity to acquire one of Vancouver’s most iconic assets,” said Jim Szabo, vice chairman of CBRE’s National Investment Team, in a statement today.

“The scale, location, and connectivity of 674 Granville St. are unmatched in the market. Situated at centre ice in Vancouver’s financial and retail district, investors have the ability to unlock significant upside through repositioning or redevelopment strategies while preserving the building’s architectural and historical legacy.”

hudsons bay downtown vancouver store permanently closed june 1 2025 f

“Permanent closure” sign posted onto the entrances of Hudson’s Bay in downtown Vancouver, shortly after 5 p.m. on Sunday, June 1, 2025. (Kenneth Chan)

Some of Hudson’s Bay’s largest locations of greatest historical significance and at prime foot-traffic locations are tied up in a 2015 joint venture with RioCan Real Estate Investment. This joint venture is largely controlled by Hudson’s Bay, which owns 78 per cent of the partnership, and RioCan with the remaining 22 per cent.

In Spring 2025, this joint venture owned 12 Hudson’s Bay locations in total comprising five freehold stores (downtown Vancouver, downtown Montreal, downtown Calgary, downtown Ottawa, and Devonshire Mall in Windsor) and five head leasehold stores (Yorkdale Shopping Centre and Scarborough Town Centre in Toronto, Square One Shopping Centre in Mississauga, and Carrefour Laval and Promenades St. Bruno near Montreal), plus two stores jointly owned by the joint venture and RioCan (Oakville Place and Georgian Mall in Ontario), each holding a 50 per cent stake.

Like the other aspects directly under HBC’s portfolio, the joint venture with RioCan was also bleeding, with HBC halting its rent payments to the joint venture, and with many of these properties seeing their mortgages mature earlier this year. The most significant of these maturities occurred in April 2025 for the $202-million mortgage attached to the downtown Vancouver building.

HBC and other entities filed and obtained Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act (CCAA) protection for the department store chain in early March 2025. The court subsequently appointed Alvarez & Marsal as the monitor of the CCAA proceedings for HBC.

The creditor protection for HBC initially enabled the company to suspend its rent payments to the joint venture with RioCan. But an agreement was later reached to have HBC pay a portion of its rent obligations to most of the joint venture’s properties. But then, the joint venture’s financial situation began to spiral due to receiving only partial rent payments.

In early June 2025, at the request of RioCan, due to the partial rent payments and high debt for the properties, the joint venture was transitioned into a court-approved receivership, with FTI Consulting Canada appointed to lead the process to displace management and liquidate assets. RioCan no longer has joint control over the joint venture, but continues to have major influence and so continues to account for the joint venture as an equity-accounted investment.

Condition of Hudson’s Bay’s downtown Vancouver store in its final days, as seen on May 24, 2025. (Kenneth Chan)

Located at the northeast corner of the intersection of West Georgia Street and Granville Street, the landmark heritage building was constructed in four different sections a century ago, with most of the building in its existing form built in 1927.

Within the 1.76-acre lot, this building has nine levels, including two underground retail levels. It has a total building floor area of about 618,000 sq. ft., with average floor plates of about 70,000 sq. ft. — making it suitable for not only large-format retailers, but also office space for major firms that prefer large open workplace formats.

The upper underground level is directly connected to CF Pacific Centre and Vancouver Centre Mall, although there is currently no access due to the former department building’s closure. As well, the Granville Street and Seymour Street entrances into SkyTrain’s Granville Station are integrated into the building’s lower underground level.

Over the years leading up to HBC’s complete closure this past June, amid growing financial challenges, the department store chain performed a high degree of deferred maintenance of many of its retail properties. The downtown Vancouver building was in poor condition at the time of its closure, with significant reinvestment needed to introduce new tenants. The store’s last day of business was June 2, 2025.

However, the more likely path that will be taken by any new future owner is a major redevelopment of the property that adds density through verticality and introduces a wide range of new uses. The ultimate sale price is likely to reflect the added potential redevelopment value.

As it is a Heritage A-listed property in the City of Vancouver’s Heritage Register, any redevelopment would also have to preserve and restore the exterior’s iconic cream terra cotta facade and Corinthian columns.

In 2022, as a key project of its newly created real estate development division to optimize its properties, HBC announced a proposal to redevelop the downtown Vancouver building into a high-density, mixed-use retail and office complex, with the heritage facade preserved, the existing interior floor plates fully demolished, and the construction of 12 additional floors above the heritage podium. There would have been one million sq. ft. of office space and 400,000 sq. ft. of retail/restaurant space, including a downsized Hudson’s Bay department store within the lower levels.

Shortly after that redevelopment concept proposed was revealed, work behind the scenes revised the design to reduce some of the office space to make way for secured purpose-built rental housing on the Seymour Street side of the property, accounting for the current downturn in office space demand.

674 Granville Street Vancouver hudsons bay redevelopment

Cancelled concept: 2022 artistic rendering of the redevelopment of Hudson’s Bay’s Vancouver flagship store at 674 Granville Street. (Perkins & Will/Streetworks Development/Hudson’s Bay Company)

hudsons bay vancouver redevelopment model 674 Granville Street

Cancelled concept: 2022 model of the Hudson’s Bay Vancouver redevelopment. (Kenneth Chan/Daily Hive)

In 2018, before the company created an in-house real estate development strategy, Daily Hive Urbanized reported that Hudson’s Bay had reached a tentative agreement to sell the downtown Vancouver property to a buyer for $675 million. This deal was never finalized.

Last month, QuadReal Property Group sold its flagship property of The Post, the heritage mixed-use office and retail redevelopment of downtown Vancouver’s former Canada Post processing centre, now anchored by Amazon’s office tech hub. It was sold for over $1.1 billion to Pontegadea Inversiones SL — the real estate and investment firm of Spanish billionaire Amancio Ortega, founder of fast fashion giant Zara.

According to BC Assessment, as of July 2024, the former Hudson’s Bay building in downtown Vancouver carries an assessed value of nearly $195 million, including $163 million for the land and $32 million for the structure.

Meanwhile, just one block to the south along Granville Street, there is construction work inside the former Nordstrom department store volume in the CF Pacific Centre building to prepare the 230,000 sq. ft. space for new tenants. The former Nordstrom space is being subdivided into four large retail units, with Aritzia confirming last month it will open a 40,000 sq. ft. new flagship store spanning four levels, including a restaurant concept within the store.

Aritzia will open the new location in 2027. The other three new retail tenants have yet to be announced.

Moreover, lululemon is taking over all 300,000 sq. ft. of office space directly above the former Nordstrom volume, replacing Microsoft and Sony Pictures Imageworks, which have relocated to other spaces in the city centre.

The Hudson’s Bay parkade across the street on Seymour Street is owned by Holborn Group, which is planning a massive mixed-use redevelopment of the parkade into three tall towers with condominium and rental housing uses, and B.C.’s largest hotel with an observation deck atop Western Canada’s tallest and first supertall tower, reaching over 1,000 ft.

aritzia vancouver cf pacific centre flagship 2

The former Nordstrom at CF Pacific Centre in downtown Vancouver, perspective from the intersection of Thurlow Street and Robson Street — where the new Aritzia flagship store will be located. (Kenneth Chan/Daily Hive)

Concept of the Bay parkade redevelopment in downtown Vancouver. (Henriquez Partners Architects/Holborn Group)

Concept of the Bay parkade redevelopment in downtown Vancouver. (Henriquez Partners Architects/Holborn Group)

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