UCLA is buying a mostly vacant office building in downtown Los Angeles, the latest university around the country to shift into workspaces that have been underused since the pandemic struck.

The university said it bought the 334,000-square-foot Trust Building at 433 S. Spring St. for an undisclosed price. The owners struggled to lure tenants after COVID-19 cut office demand as remote work took hold, prompting them to offer a $1 million bonus in December 2021 to any broker who could do an office deal in the building under certain circumstances. The property was just 13% leased when it hit the market in October.

From New York to Atlanta to Los Angeles, universities are transforming cubicles into classrooms as demand weakens for office space, reducing offering prices and attracting nonprofits and other untraditional buyers. Landlords are more willing to consider different types of deals when faced with office building usage that's less than 50%, according to anonymous key-swipe data from building security firm Kastle Systems.

The universities say their students can benefit from being in the heart of major cities, with a wide variety of cultural and vocational opportunities nearby. For UCLA, the space "will further intertwine UCLA and L.A., helping us to deepen the impact of our teaching, research and public service mission," Chancellor Gene Block and Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Darnell Hunt said in the statement.

In New York, underutilized offices are making way for multiple new schools. Touro University, the largest private U.S. institution of higher and professional education under Jewish auspices, leased nearly 310,000 square feet in the 30-story skyscraper 3 Times Square in the tourism draw of Times Square. The building is roughly 63% leased, according to CoStar data.

Beyond Touro, the 160-plus-year-old St. Francis College in New York signed a 30-year lease spanning about 255,000 square feet to relocate to a new 10-story office tower above Macy’s in downtown Brooklyn. NYU Langone renewed a roughly 595,000-square-foot lease at Vornado Realty Trust’s One Park Ave. in late 2020 after adding nearly 54,000 square feet in a new lease in the building, according to CoStar data. That same year, it inked a deal spanning more than 195,000 square feet at 601-635 Lexington Ave., co-owned by Boston Properties and Norges Bank Investment Management.

Universities aren't just taking vacant office space in New York. In downtown Louisville, Kentucky, health insurance firm Humana donated an eight-story, 130,000-square-foot office building to the University of Louisville in June 2022, according to a statement by Humana.

The health insurer, one of the largest employers in Louisville, was shrinking its office footprint after allowing employees to work remotely.

In Atlanta, buying office space is nothing new to Georgia State University, which has been acquiring buildings and developing new ones in downtown Atlanta over the past two decades to accommodate its growth. Georgia State is the state's largest institution of higher learning based on its enrollment of 47,094 students. In 2013, the university purchased the 560,000-square-foot 55 Park Place office tower in downtown Atlanta for its business school.

In Los Angeles, UCLA is the latest school to expand its presence in downtown. Arizona State University said in April it wanted to buy 919 S. Grand Ave. after taking over the Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising, a school housed in the building, earlier this year.

Until converting the space to classrooms, UCLA plans to use the building for program and administrative offices, according to the statement. UCLA's 419-acre main campus is located on L.A.'s Westside.

In addition to Los Angeles-based Rising Realty, the building's other owner was Houston-based Lionstone. The building's other tenants include Rising Realty, KTGY Architecture + Planning and corporate offices of the José Andrés restaurant group, according to the statement.

While the price was undisclosed, someone familiar with the deal said the office space sold for roughly $40 million, or about $119 per square foot.

Rising and Lionstone bought the building in June 2016 for $80.4 million, or about $237.89 per square foot, according to CoStar data.

The Trust Building is the largest office to trade in downtown Los Angeles since March, when the 40-story, roughly 701,000-square-foot Union Bank Plaza at 445 S. Figueroa St. sold for $111 million, or $158 per square foot. Both sales are below the downtown Los Angeles average of $369 per square foot, according to CoStar data.

Rising Realty, established by real estate veterans Nelson and Christopher Rising, is no stranger to UCLA. Nelson, who died earlier this year, attended UCLA on a football scholarship and graduated from the school of law in 1967, according to a statement.

Nelson celebrated his 80th birthday in 2021 at UCLA’s Wasserman Football Center, according to the statement.

Andria Cheng contributed to this story.