The Academy of Art University was founded in San Francisco in 1929. In the past 10 years or so it has rapidly expanded to nearly 9,000 students, gobbling up real estate for classrooms and dorms.

The for-profit Academy of Art University appears to be selling its 114-unit student dorm building at 825 Sutter St., known as The Commodore, to a buyer that would restore the building's former use ...