The late lamented Borders bookstore will hopefully stand vacant no longer. A local company plans to lease the space, according to Andrew Hunt, president of Myron Hunt, the firm that owns the building.

“We are in late-stage negotiations with a growing local business,” he said. “We expect to share more soon.”

Myron Hunt, a commercial real estate development company specializing in retail properties, has spent the past two years seeking a tenant for the Borders building. After waiting for the Borders company’s bankruptcy procedures to conclude, the development firm faced the issues of today’s economy.

“These are challenging retail conditions,” Hunt said. “Stores are not in expansion mode after the downturn.”

Myron Hunt also has been selective about its possible tenants, wanting to maximize the use of the building and its space. The firm wanted to find a business that would fit into Saratoga’s downtown.

“We love Saratoga and are very comfortable with our investment there,” said Hunt, whose main office is in Amherst, N.Y. Myron Hunt’s properties are a number of shopping centers in upstate New York and New England. “We passed on applicants who didn’t seem to fit the space. We didn’t want to make a poor decision.”

The size of the former Borders store has been another issue. The two-story space totals 34,848 square feet. Myron Hunt preferred to find a single tenant to take the whole building, rather than spending the capital and putting the design commitment into a reconfiguration of the store for two or more companies.

“We have luckily had the wherewithal to wait and find the right business,” Hunt said. “We are very excited to have such a suitable local tenant who can use the building as it is configured, with two stories and a central staircase.”

Myron Hunt will have an official announcement about the transaction in one week or two weeks, he said.

--Jennie