Real Estate: Profits in Vertical City

LIVE UPTOWN . . . WORK DOWNTOWN. YOU CAN COMMUTE BY ELEVATOR IN SECONDS. As its full-page newspaper ads suggest, Chicago's 100-story John Hancock Center is a most unusual building. The world's second tallest, the 1,107-ft.-high skyscraper* is designed, in effect, as an apartment house atop an office building. A forerunner of the multipurpose "vertical city" of the future, it also looks like a financial winner. As the first tenant moved in last week, the owner, Boston-based John Hancock Mutual Life Insurance Co., predicted that by next year the building will be producing a "respectable return" of about $7.5 million annually on the company's $95 million investment.

Faulty Caisson. Laced by giant cross girders and faced with bronze-tinted glass and ebony-colored aluminum, the John Hancock structure tapers dramatically upward in the Chicago skyline like a flat-topped oil derrick. The first 43 floors are designed largely for commercial use. There will be five floors for a bank, a brokerage office and retail shops. Above that come seven floors of parking space—enough for 1,200 autos—and then 28 floors of office space, which will add at least 7% to Chicago's supply. There is a 44th-floor "sky lobby," consisting of a barber shop, drugstore and a number of similar services for residents. The building's 705 apartments, ranging from a one-bedroom, $220-a-month unit on the 45th floor to a three-bedroom, $775 spread on the 92nd, give residents breathtaking views and the distinction of being the world's most rarefied apartment dwellers. The top eight floors will house restaurants, an observation deck and air conditioning and other machinery.

For John Hancock, which is also constructing a new 60-story headquarters building in Boston, the Chicago venture represents the biggest real estate investment in its history. The project was actually the brainchild of Philadelphia Developer Jerry Wolman, who proposed that John Hancock help finance it. The company agreed, paid out $6,000,000 for a block-long parcel of land on fashionable North Michigan Avenue and leased it to Wolman. Soon after ground was broken in late 1965, however, Wolman found himself overextended in a number of other financial dealings. His troubles were aggravated when a faulty support caisson required the costly dismantling of part of the building's superstructure. Wolman wound up selling his interest in the skyscraper for a $5,000,000 loss in late 1966. He is currently involved in bankruptcy proceedings in an effort to salvage his interests, which include ownership of 52% of the National Football League's Philadelphia Eagles.