A Wellington office tower, designed by the late Sir Ian Athfield and named best commercial building 30 years ago, is up for sale.

Originally built for Hewlett Packard, the 10-storey Willis St building is now known as New Zealand Language Centre (NZLC) House.

The building, which includes ground-floor retail and nine levels of office space, was built in 1987 when the stock market crash was causing shockwaves around the financial world.

The property was last sold in 2008 to Integra Strategic Property No. 2 for $13.5 million. Company director, Murray Cole, was the former owner of Paraparaumu Airport.

Bayleys Wellington agent Mark Sherlock said Cole was selling the land and building as his aviation business interests kept him off-shore for most of the year, and the property needed management.

"While the property has sound existing tenant credentials ... there is definitely scope to extract another $200,000, or so, out of the building [by sourcing more tenants] and given the amount of CBD office stock taken out of the market post-earthquake, a more hands-on owner has plenty to work with.

"The building is generally regarded as the best quality building in this precinct and it has an enviable leasing history."

The most likely buyer for the property would be a New Zealander who recognised the leasing potential the building had, Sherlock said.

"The property has a current net income of $1.078m and an assessed potential net income of $1.28m when fully leased."

The building meets 70 per cent of new building standard, and, as at September 2015, has a rateable value (RV) of $13.5m.

Existing tenants include Ministry of Social Development, NEC, Shamrock Recruitment, NZ Translations Centre, and NZLC, one of New Zealand's largest English language teaching institutions.

The building has 5826 square metres of lettable space with 59 car parks. It sits on a 2102sqm site on the Willis St between Dixon and Ghuznee streets.