By Daniel Geiger

Barclays has hired a team from CB Richard Ellis to sell 475 Fifth Avenue, according to sources. The British bank took back the nearly 300,000 s/f office property in 2009 during the depths of the recession from a partnership between the landlord Joe Moinian and the real estate investment company Westbrook Partners, which had paid $163 million to buy the building during the boom. Moinian and Westbrook defaulted on the property after clearing it out to create a high-end building, an idea that preceded the industry’s precipitous downturn and fell on disastrous timing when the market collapsed.