Restaurateur pays $3.8M for former Morton’s steakhouse space in LoDo

The erstwhile downtown Denver location of Morton’s The Steakhouse has sold to an entity affiliated with the proprietor of a determination concatenation of Mexican restaurants.

Wazee River LLC purchased the retail portion astatine 1745 Wazee St., connected the crushed level of a condominium building, for $3.76 cardinal successful August, according to nationalist records.

The entity is managed by Pat McGaughran, according to indebtedness documents. McGaughran is the laminitis and proprietor of Rio Grande Mexican Restaurant, which has 5 locations betwixt Lone Tree and Fort Collins.

McGaughran, who besides co-founded the Rare Italian edifice successful Fort Collins, did not respond to requests for remark past week.

Thomas Gounley, BusinessDen

The 8,400-square-foot retail portion is connected the crushed level of the condo gathering astatine the country of 18th and Wazee streets.

Rio Grande, founded successful Fort Collins successful 1986, already has a beingness successful downtown Denver, astatine 1525 Blake St. The concatenation appears to lease that property.

The Wazee retail portion is 8,400 quadrate feet, according to brokerage NAI Shames Makovsky, which makes the woody worthy $447 a quadrate foot.

The portion was sold by Meesawdah LLC, which paid $1.03 cardinal for it successful 1999, records show. NAI Shames Makovsky Managing Partner Evan Makovsky and Barry Gilbert signed merchantability paperwork connected behalf of the entity. NAI Shames Makovsky brokers Dorit Fischer and Hayden Hirschfeld represented the seller.

Morton’s closed its LoDo restaurant, on with locations successful different cities, erstwhile the coronavirus pandemic acceptable successful and prompted governments to prohibition indoor dining. The company, a subsidiary of Texas-based Landry’s Inc., leased the space.