The Department of Government Efficiency recently claimed to end an annual $1.48 million lease of a Hoffman Estates building as the temporary archive of the Barack Obama Presidential Library, but a move planned for the materials to a permanent site in Maryland was already announced last August. The 74,200-square-foot former Plunkett Furniture store at 2500 W. Golf Road owned by Hoffman Estates Medical Development LLC was leased by the National Archives and Records Administration since the autumn of 2016, just as Obama was preparing to leave the White House. The lease was renewed in 2022 through what expected to be Dec. 31, 2026. But Bob Huber, vice president of investment sales for Imperial Realty Co., which handles the building’s leasing, said the lease was due to end in September 2025 anyway. He sees the change as an opportunity, rather than a hardship. “I am starting to market the thing right now,” Huber said. As soon as the property showed up on DOGE’s list of terminating federal leases, he said he’s been flooded with inquiries about its availability — including about 200 on Wednesday alone. That number of inquiries usually results in at least three or four serious players who want to discuss a deal, Huber said. With its unique security and climate-control upgrades, the building could be of use for enterprises that particularly need those or just its sheer size, he added. NARA officials Thursday said a permanent move of the Obama archives and its center of operations to College Park, Maryland was announced last summer, well before Trump was elected or DOGE was even created. Huber said his understanding of what’s been happening in Hoffman Estates is materials were digitized and copied for display at the future Obama library near the University of Chicago, with no original NARA holdings to be displayed there. That work is likely nearly completed, he added. Many of those who examined the building in 2016 as potential work site showed an unusual amount of enthusiasm, but that was mainly because they lived nearby, Huber came to learn. Having gotten to visit the temporary archive himself, Huber said the building is extraordinary not only for its mission-specific upgrades, but also its meticulous upkeep. He joked that he would have no hesitation about finishing a McDonald’s Quarter Pounder accidentally dropped on the floor. “Those floors are just spotless!” he said. The forthcoming Obama library is described by NARA as the first fully digital of the 14 Presidential libraries it administers. An estimated 95% of the Obama administration’s records were originally digital. The agency also received about 30 million pages of unclassified paper records.