Sam Zell said Friday that he is putting the Tribune Tower, the Chicago Tribune headquarters, on the market.
Zell said that he is looking to increase the value of the Tribune Tower, as well as the Los Angeles Times' headquarters, Times Mirror Square. Zell said that Times Mirror Square He said he would use to proceeds to pay off the Tribune Co.'s debt.
Zell, the real estate magnate, bought the Tribune Co. for $8.2 billion in December, turning the media giant private. However, the Tribune Co. debt totals around $13 billion.
Zell already sold Newsday, the Tribune Co.'s newspaper in Long Island, NY, to Cablevision for $650 million. Zell expects to trim down the debt with the anticipated sale of the Chicago Cubs and Wrigley Field.
According to Chicago Tribune news reports, Tribune Co.'s Baltimore Sun Media Group, which runs the Baltimore Sun, announced Wednesday that it will eliminate about 100 jobs from its workforce of around 1,400 by early August.
Tribune Co.'s Hartford Courant were told of plans to cut around 25 percent of its newsroom, which currently numbers 232 positions.
The Tribune Tower, a 940,000-square-foot building, is about 35 percent vacant, as Chicago Tribune newspaper staff and Tribune Co. offices occupy about 55 percent of the building. Third-party tenants, including CNN's Chicago bureau, occupy the remaining 10 percent.
Zell was a guest on the CNBC's "Squawk Box", saying that he wants to change the newspaper business. He expressed that he wants fewer journalists that working harder and newspapers that produce stories that people want to read.
Zell also said that the oil prices will spark mass conservation. "I think the American people and the rest of the world will cut the use of oil in the next 12 months to levels people never thought were possible," said Zell in his live CNBC interview.
Zell also praised the Federal Reserve Bank for how it has been cutting rates. "The Fed has done a very good job with this whole situation," he said. "If I had any criticism at all I would have suggested they acted earlier."
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