Earlier this year, LDS owned Deseret News anounced big time layoffs as part of an effort to stay in business. Another part of this effort to save money, was also moving their offices from the Deseret News Building over into the Triad Center to share offices with LDS owned KSL television station.

The once proud Deseret News Building now stands empty. Does anyone know LDS.Inc plans to with it. Sell it? Try to lease it out? Demolish it and build something else? Mighty Builder are you out there? My guess is that they will try to sell it, which might be kind of hard in this economy. Part of me hope it's not demolished. I always kind of liked that building. I think that spiral staircase going all the way to the top is the coolest thing.

Now that it's empty it's just a drain LDS Inc's money supply. So I'm guessing they'll do something really soon.

The church pays cash for everything. It's not like they're still paying off the building.

Just like a house or a car, the initial purchase price is just the start of the expense.

They have to keep it clean, keep the heat on to prevent the pipes from bursting, and keep most of its systems running. If not, the building will rapidly decay and lose value.

On top of that, DN is a for-profit enterprise, so its building is subject to real estate taxes.

Even if they own the building out-right, they will lose money just letting it sit there.

There's also security. An empty building could attract vandals or squatters.

They could always turn the building into a homeless shelter and give any potential squatters a LEGITIMATE place to live ... oh, wait ... silly me ... I forgot which "church" we were talking about!!!

Stray Mutt Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The church pays cash for everything. It's not like
> they're still paying off the building.


So they say. But they could have a mountain of debt and nobody would know it because nobody is allowed to see the books.

As I recall, that building was only recently constructed, like in the past 15 years. I guess the magic eye glasses were not working that day, when they decided to build the building.

Or more likely, pay some mall bills.

I need to clarify some things here. The building isn't vacant. I work there. Other floors have some occupants, albeit few. But, a new tenant is moving in by late summer who will have several floors from what I've been told. Ownership has been transferred to another arm of the church's real estate holdings. It is quite empty, yes, but not totally vacant.

I was told that Deseret News was the buildings only occupant. Maybe they meant, the only major occupant.