The giant media conglomerate, Time Warner is reportedly contemplating the sale of its New York City headquarters. The company has requested three real estate firms to appraise the net worth of its headquarters.
The request to calculate the worth of the property comes as the company considers the best alternatives for shoring up its business. The company may choose to just lease the building or completely sell away the Columbia Circle headquarters, reports News Cast Studio.
The 1.1 million square feet building was built after Time Warner declared its merger with America Online in 2000. The building was originally called "The AOL Time Warner Center" but came to be known just as "The Time Warner center" by the time it opened in 2004. The company's headquarters are in the south tower while the other tower houses the Mandarin Oriental Hotel and residential condos, reports Reuters.
If the company decides to sell its headquarters, the sale will be one of the biggest real estate deals of the year, reports Wall Street Journal.
Apart from the Time Warner center, the company occupies 15 other buildings in the New York Metro area, with around 10 offices in Manhattan alone.
Time Warner, the parent company of HBO, CNN, Time Inc and the Warner Brothers Studio, has been contemplating the plans and consequences of the sale and its other alternatives for more than a year now. Value of the company stands at around $47 billion. However, the company is rapidly changing its strategies to adapt to the market. Recently, Time Inc. cut around 500 jobs and the CNN channel is being overhauled for its poor viewer ratings as well.
However, Time Warner is not the only media giant trying to unload office space. More recently, Sony Corp. sold its Madison Avenue Headquarters in January 2012. Popular publishing house, Condé Nast is also planning to shift base to One World Trade Center by 2014.