University of the Arts real estate sales are moving forward as a company has been hired to sell 9 buildings

Coming soon: nine prime pieces of Center City real estate — 760,000 square feet worth.

The former University of the Arts buildings constitute a “generational opportunity,” said an official with JLL, the real estate services company. JLL has been hired by the university’s bankruptcy trustee to handle the sale.

“The sale process is designed to maximize value for the stakeholders in the university’s bankruptcy case,” JLL officials said in a statement. “The portfolio may be purchased in its entirety, as a combination of properties or on an individual basis.”

» READ MORE: UArts has filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy to liquidate its assets

The university’s abrupt June shutdown stunned the city; officials said at the time that an unexpected financial crisis forced the closure. UArts filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in September.

The school, which operated for 150 years, had accumulated bond debt of around $46 million and other liabilities.

UArts officials in that filing claimed $67 million debt in total, and $93 million in assets, mostly the real estate. The sale has the potential to reshape the Avenue of the Arts.

Five of the nine buildings up for sale have “historic” designation.

The total portfolio includes Arts Bank, Anderson Hall, Hamilton Hall, Furness Hall, Juniper Hall, Gershman Hall, Terra Hall, Arts Alliance, and Spruce Hall. They had housed offices, classrooms, libraries, residence halls, theater and other performance spaces, galleries, and more; most sit on South Broad Street between City Hall and South Street.

» READ MORE: UArts owned a string of iconic Center City properties

“Almost all of the properties offer mixed-use zoning, allowing for a variety of future uses. Many will likely become apartments, but the campus offers an array of opportunities,” JLL senior managing director Fran Coyne said in the statement.

Jim Galbally, another JLL senior managing director handling the sale, underscored the value of the buildings to Philadelphia.

“The real estate represented in The University of the Arts portfolio allows an investor a generational opportunity to reshape the heart” of the city’s central business district, Galbally said in the statement.

One potential buyer of part of the portfolio? Other universities, particularly Temple University, which had attempted to negotiate an acquisition of UArts this summer before the Hamilton Family Charitable Trust, a major donor to UArts’ endowment, blocked the transfer of that endowment to Temple. Now, the matter is in Orphans Court.

New Temple president John Fry said the university is potentially interested in purchasing some of the former UArts buildings.

“Should we have a more visible role and site in Center City? To be determined,” Fry previously told The Inquirer.

JLL will be paid a minimum of 1% of whatever the properties sell for, according to the Oct. 16 bankruptcy court order allowing the company to be hired. The maximum JLL could earn is 3.5% of the proceeds if the properties bring in a total of more than $100 million.

Staff writers Harold Brubaker and Susan Snyder contributed to this article.