Developers Gecker, Miller list 19th-century Shockoe mansion-turned-offices

The Pace-King House on 19th Street in Shockoe Bottom is for sale. (Photos courtesy CVRMLS)

One of the older buildings in Richmond’s oldest neighborhood is up for grabs with a seven-figure price tag.

The 19th-century Pace-King House at 205 N. 19th St. hit the market in recent weeks with an asking price of $1.8 million.

The Italianate-style mansion-turned-office building was listed April 22 by sellers Dan Gecker and Robin Miller, whose Urban Development Associates took over an unfinished renovation of the property after they purchased it in 2011.

The firm had kept an office in the building since then and leased out parts of it to other tenants. The quarter-acre property also includes an outbuilding with three one-bedroom apartments.

The 1860s-era mansion has been converted to offices.

Miller, who keeps his own office in Linden Tower in Monroe Ward, said they’re selling the Pace-King building because Gecker, a former Chesterfield County supervisor, is retiring.

Robin Miller

“That was his office and we had a big conference room there, and he doesn’t need it anymore,” Miller said. “He’s going to be working from home on what he’s still working with, so it just made sense to go ahead and sell it.”

Tom Rosman and Lory Markham of One South Commercial have the listing.

After paying $700,000 for it in 2011, Miller and Gecker put in another $500,000 or so for rehabbing the property, which a previous owner had started converting into apartments. The duo used state and federal tax credits to renovate the main building as offices.

“It’s a wonderful building,” Miller said. “It’s got three great apartments in the back. It’s perfect for a small company. There’s six separate large offices in the building, two on each floor.”

Built in 1860, the building is one of the older structures in Shockoe Bottom, which also is home to the nearby Adam Craig House and Masons’ Hall, both of which date to the 1780s.

The Pace-King building totals over 7,000 square feet and features a cast-iron veranda and fencing. The building is named for two of its owners over the years: James B. Pace, a tobacconist and city treasurer who owned it from 1865 to 1881; and Jane King, who bought it from Pace and owned it until 1911, according to its National Register of Historic Places nomination form.

The building’s rooms feature high ceilings and windows, as well as hardwood floors and fireplaces.

The property was listed to the national and Virginia registers in 1976, when it was “rescued from dereliction” by the group now known as Preservation Virginia. It was later sold and restored as offices for Scope Mechanical Contractors, according to the Virginia Landmarks Commission.

The commission describes the main house as “one of the city of Richmond’s last grand mansions erected before the Civil War” and its scale and detailing as “representing a final expression of architectural fashion before the dissolution of the Old South.”

Rosman said the apartments total 2,600 square feet. The rear yard includes a brick patio and fountain.

Three one-bedroom apartments are in an outbuilding behind the main house.

Since listing it, Rosman said he and Markham have shown the property a handful of times, including to a group that was interested in making it a co-working space. Rosman said the building would appeal to law firms, financial firms and creative office users.

“It’s going to be somebody that appreciates an older building, appreciates the craftsmanship,” he said.

The property is next door to a former synagogue that’s now the Shockoe Valley Lofts, an apartment conversion that Miller’s Miller & Associates completed in 2003.

According to a 2013 Style Weekly article, the buildings were part of a Jewish enclave that made up part of Richmond’s original street grid, which spanned from 17th to 25th streets and from Broad Street to the river.

The Pace-King House property is assessed by the city at $1.5 million.

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