RICHMOND, Va. — A trio of Shockoe Bottom developers is looking to a notorious night club for their latest downtown project.
Yogi Singh, Stewart Garland and Pushkal Basavaraj bought the former Have a Nice Day Cafe building at 11 S. 18th St. this week and plan to convert the three-story property into an office building for a single tenant, Singh said.
They paid $575,000 for the 13,000-square-foot building that has been shuttered for more than a year after Have a Nice Day closed. The property’s previous owners, Ken Farino and Mason Wyatt, put the building on the market about a year ago.
Have a Nice Day Cafe had an uneasy history prior to its closing. Its customers were blamed by some for at least one shooting and other violence in the Bottom in years past, and some neighboring businesses sought to have it shut down.
Singh, Garland and Basavaraj are all principals at local real estate firm Capital Square Management, which has offices in the Fan and Innsbrook. The Have a Nice Day deal is at least the group’s third project in the Shockoe Bottom area.
“We have been in neighborhood and really like the energy that we experience during the day and the energy that this vibrant neighborhood has,” Singh said. “We saw an opportunity to purchase it as a building that qualifies for state and federal tax credits in a location that was prime for a different use given the apartments and restaurants popping up.”
Visit RichmondBizSense.com to continue reading this article.
