STRATACACHE Owner And CEO Riegel Buys Office Tower In Dayton

December 21, 2018 by Dave Haynes

The dollar goes a bit further in Dayton, Ohio, the head office city of the digital signage solutions company STRATACACHE.

The company’s owner and CEO Chris Riegel has purchased a 12-storey office block in the city’s downtown – the Courthouse Plaza building at 10 N. Ludlow Street – for $1.67 million.

Riegel confirmed the purchase Thursday with that city’s local newspaper, but didn’t get into his reasons – other than saying redevelopment happening in the area looked promising. “I’m a people business,” he told the Dayton Daily News. “Attracting the best and brightest talent means having the best location.”

Dayton has for many years been going through hard times, with Riegel’s company able to buy an office tower for the kind of money people in some hot tech cities pay for a relatively modest house. The building was bought from a bank, which foreclosed on it after the building’s ownership group failed to make payment on a $6 million mortgage.

The city of Dayton owns the land beneath the building, the paper reports, but the office tower has been leased since the mid-1970s. I’ve only been in downtown Dayton a couple of times, but remember this building being on the city’s main drag. It is only about five blocks from the existing head office building.

Riegel already owns several other buildings in the city – offices and production/warehouse spaces.

Dayton, once a booming city, has its issues, but also its benefits. It’s not hard to hire, salaries aren’t through the roof like they are in places like San Francisco and New York, and residential real estate is also very affordable for younger people who want to own property and perhaps start a family. A quick look at listings suggests someone can buy a house in Dayton for way less than the $100,000.