Snohomish county WA - Mixed use Office - conversion to residential?

[Brian Hughes]

Hi All - 

There is a mixed use commercial office building for sale in Snohomish county,   WA.     Its mostly office space but has several residential apartments.   the office portion is vacant as are some of the apartments.    The overall building condition is not terrible having been local offices of a well known national charity up until recently.    Location is in an urban residential area.    I'm very familiar with the rental market around there having one of my properties on the same block.

Is there anybody on this forum who has direct experience with "change of use" or adaptive reuse of space?    Specifically conversion of the commercial portions of this building to apartments.   I know "change of use" frequently triggers major expenses like seismic retrofits, insulation and fire code updates.   Its not just a matter of rearranging dividing walls plumbing and electrical.