Nanaimo school district has sold the former Waterloo Elementary School property for $210,000.
The school board approved the sale of the two-room school, situated near Nanaimo Airport, to Jeongrae Kim of Port Hardy at a meeting Wednesday. According to secretary-treasurer Phil Turin, the original asking price was $267,000.
“The $210,000 will go into the board's local capital fund and hopefully, be held along with some other proceeds that we've got for future development,” said Turin.
He said the school district has been working on an asset management plan, which looks at all the buildings that have been closed and sitting idle. The school, which dates back to the old Cassidy school district, has been closed for many years, and has been on market since July 2012.
Turin said another buyer made an offer last year.
“We had an offer last fall that didn't really get public because there were a number of conditions by the perspective purchaser at the time and one of the key conditions was zoning, and he wasn't able to do what he wanted to do within the current zoning, so that offer fell through,” said Turin, adding that the offer from Kim came a few weeks ago.
“I'm not certain what the buyer's going to do with the property but certainly, he didn't have any conditions,” Turin said. “He'd done his due diligence with the [Regional District of Nanaimo] and the zoning etc., so the board sold it for $210,000.”
The board accepted the offer in a closed meeting, also on Wednesday, and passed a bylaw at the open meeting, which is a requirement of the School Act.
Turin said the deal closed yesterday.