WARWICK – A 20,000-square-foot warehouse building in the city that was put into receivership by a state court due to a failure by the prior owner to pay city taxes was recently sold at an auction for $1.7 million, according to Sweeney Real Estate & Appraisal, the real estate firm that facilitated the transaction.
The former home of Marandola Mechanical Inc., a mechanical contractor that was also known as Merit Service LLC, attracted “a lot of interest” at a recent auction, with “seven active bidders” in attendance, Sweeney Real Estate said.
Junior Realty LLC placed the winning bid to buy the 24 Minnesota Ave. building, located just off U.S. Route 1, near Rhode Island T.F. Green International Airport, the real estate firm said.
Junior Realty LLC is registered to Michael A. Grieco Jr., CEO of the Grieco Automotive Group, which operates a Toyota dealership in East Providence and a Honda dealership in Johnston.
The property was sold to Junior Realty with two leases intact, Sweeney Real Estate said. The Minnesota Avenue industrial property was leased out earlier this year while the building remained in receivership. A 5,560-square-foot section of the property was leased out to a nonprofit called Love for Life. A business named Direct Discount, which resells scratched and dented appliances, leased another 4,850 square feet of the building.
The building was last owned by Wildfield Properties LLC, which was managed by Anthony P. Marandola, who headed the mechanical contracting services company that was once based at the site. Marandola died on Oct. 8, 2021, at age 84.
The Warwick industrial building was constructed in 1984 on a 1.8-acre lot, according to city property assessment records.
The industrial property was last valued by Warwick assessors in 2021 as being worth $950,000, according to an online database of city property records.