UTC to remain in Gold Builing through 2014.

[beerbeer]

Maybe Perez can take credit for that even though he had nothing to do with it.

[MadVlad]

I'm just wondering how much Travelers had to pay Abe Giles to make it happen....

[robm324]

Wasn't this UTC not Travelers? Or was it both. In today's HBJ Today, there was a blurb about UTC renewing its lease through 2014....see below.....

Tycoon, its just a blurb, so I thought posting would be ok, but take it out if its not cool.....

UTC renews downtown lease (posted Today at 11:55am)

Aerospace and industrial conglomerate United Technologies Corp. has renewed the lease for its corporate headquarters at One Financial Plaza in Hartford, also known as the Gold Building, through December 2014. The lease encompasses 174,000 square feet of the building, where other major tenants include Accenture and People's Bank. The Gold Building has been UTC's headquarters since 1974.

[uconn99]

Yeah, I didn't think Travelers was in the gold building. They have their own tower and ugly building near the tower.

174,000 square feet for UTC seems small?

[MadVlad]

Yeah, I didn't think Travelers was in the gold building. They have their own tower and ugly building near the tower.

174,000 square feet for UTC seems small?

[Theophrastus Bombastus]

Actually, they have about 8 buildings in the city....

[MadVlad]

1) Travelers Tower aka Main St. South building

2) Central Row building (brown brick)

3) Grove St. building

4) Main St. North

5) Plaza building

6) Office on Windsor St. north of 84

7) Office in Windsor just west of 91

Also, space is rented in Constitution Plaza and State House Square.

[HartfordTycoon]

I think Travelers did lease space in the Gold Building recently as well when they announced they needed more space Downtown.

[superstudlyhunk]

I think Travelers did lease space in the Gold Building recently as well when they announced they needed more space Downtown.

[Theophrastus Bombastus]

this is good news, but if UTX was to ever leave Hartford for better office space that would devastate the regional economy. The Gold building is nice, but nothing special..a low-end Class A building at most. For one of the top companies in America I think it's headquarters could sure use an upgrade.

here's my suggestion: If you want to keep them here for good, I would offer a TIF incentive to an experienced developer, maybe Gottesdiener (or anyone else really), to begin construction of a build-to-suit Trophy Class building for the UTX World Headquarters. The whole acquisition & development process, if done efficiently beginning now, would take about 4 years, so once UTX's gold building lease comes up for renewal again they can hop into their new impressive office building in Hartford and won't consider moving elsewhere. There are some huge corporations based here that would love to move into newer, impressive space in the city, and probably wouldn't mind paying the extra buck/psf for rent. This move of course would drop the Gold building's occupancy rate , but if you're the owner you cut your pricing and suddenly you have a very attractive and affordable office building for rent in the heart of downtown to attract businesses back into the city.

just my two cents on what can be done

[jcrc]

Aren't you guys too optimistic? I doubt anyone is going to build any trophy office tower until vacancy due to Met Life is filled. If Stilts building is revert back to Class A status, then I would think there is an over supply of office space. Beside with only 300 employees in downtown Hartford, I am not sure anyone is going to build anything for them. And who are these huge corporations that don't mind paying the extra buck/psf for rent? I thought Hartford is losing not gaining jobs.

[Theophrastus Bombastus]

Aren't you guys too optimistic? I doubt anyone is going to build any trophy office tower until vacancy due to Met Life is filled. If Stilts building is revert back to Class A status, then I would think there is an over supply of office space. Beside with only 300 employees in downtown Hartford, I am not sure anyone is going to build anything for them. And who are these huge corporations that don't mind paying the extra buck/psf for rent? I thought Hartford is losing not gaining jobs.

[MadVlad]

Aren't you guys too optimistic? I doubt anyone is going to build any trophy office tower until vacancy due to Met Life is filled. If Stilts building is revert back to Class A status, then I would think there is an over supply of office space. Beside with only 300 employees in downtown Hartford, I am not sure anyone is going to build anything for them. And who are these huge corporations that don't mind paying the extra buck/psf for rent? I thought Hartford is losing not gaining jobs.

[jcrc]

Dare to dream, jc, dare to dream. Don't you own a shop on Pratt? This would be great for you...

[MadVlad]

Yeah, if we have a full class A office tower where that damned surface lot is at, I bet I can retire to Riviera where all beaches are topless. Cheap French wine and tan bosoms, now that is dare to dream.

[superstudlyhunk]

Aren't you guys too optimistic? I doubt anyone is going to build any trophy office tower until vacancy due to Met Life is filled. If Stilts building is revert back to Class A status, then I would think there is an over supply of office space. Beside with only 300 employees in downtown Hartford, I am not sure anyone is going to build anything for them. And who are these huge corporations that don't mind paying the extra buck/psf for rent? I thought Hartford is losing not gaining jobs.

[MadVlad]

If the city management wasn't retarded, they would set about a plan to build a nice, new state-of-the-art building, and then scour the Earth looking for a company to locate to an intelligent, highly-educated, dynamic city like Hartford. They could literally have a full time employee or 3 calling company after company after company and I can guarantee they'd find some willing to relocate to the city. Lack of aggressiveness is one of the many achilles heels of this city....

[T52]

[quote I think this is an idea that needs to be explored more from a financial standpoint by some developer, or the city. From a developer's standpoint, it looks attractive to build here given some public financing.. there's positive office absorption, decreasing vacancy, and increasing rates. You have plenty of large corporations to lure in to potentially the best office space in the city..just off the top of my head: United Technologies, Aetna, The Hartford, Travelers, Phoenix, Mass Mutual, and other larger offices like ING, Lincoln Financial Group, Cigna, and the multitude of middle-market insurers, lenders, and bank groups.

[superstudlyhunk]

[quote I think this is an idea that needs to be explored more from a financial standpoint by some developer, or the city. From a developer's standpoint, it looks attractive to build here given some public financing.. there's positive office absorption, decreasing vacancy, and increasing rates. You have plenty of large corporations to lure in to potentially the best office space in the city..just off the top of my head: United Technologies, Aetna, The Hartford, Travelers, Phoenix, Mass Mutual, and other larger offices like ING, Lincoln Financial Group, Cigna, and the multitude of middle-market insurers, lenders, and bank groups.

A little reality check here guys. State House Square recently sold for about $90.00 per square foot with rents about a quarter of that (the Sage Allen cost about 1.5 times that to develop after whatever help was provided). A nice building could easily break the $200 mark. Can Hartford support $50 rents?

[drc72]

Good idea... and I say put it in that godawful empty lot where Renaissance Place is never going - you could even stick a boutique hotel in for all the visiting UTC muckety-mucks.

[T52]

I don't think this analogy is comparing apples to oranges. While it's a good point, i don't think you can use a recent sale price to justify new rent for a new-construction office building. State House Square rented for $22.50, standard for class A office.. whoever sold it for 90 psf simply cashed out for dirt cheap, a poor decision in my mind. This doesn't mean you can take a recent sale price of 90 psf, see that rents were a quarter of that amount, and then take a potential sales value for new construction and assume rent will be a quarter of that amount. that's just not how it works.. you use market rent comps, which happen to be hovering around $22 for Class A, and up that price a bit.. theoretically a bulk discount rate would be applied as an incentive for an anchor tenant, so it wouldn't increase by much. to answer your question, no, hartford cannot support $50 rents, neither can Chicago nor most of NY.

I don't think it's too far-fetched of an idea, and could be feasible given some tax or parking incentive from the city, which if i were the city, i'd do whatever it takes to get a trophy class tower built to keep up with everyone else.

[jcrc]

The way I see it, market demand isn't always what dictates the decision to build in a downtown area. Many cities have poor occupancy percentages, but continue to build, living by the mantra "if you build it they will come." In this suggestion (and it's only a hypothetical concept at best), United Technologies would sign a pre-leasing agreement with the developer to occupy x% of the new space, provided the building is built on time. Now granted they do only have 300 employees here, but 26,500 in Connecticut, so there is plenty of leeway for them to consolidate staff into a world class headquarters.

At any rate, i would think under any lease agreement UTC would get a discounted bulk incentive rate, but discounting a trophy class office would likely yield a similar rate as a typical Class A office in Hartford, or $22.13/PSF according to a market report by CB Richard Ellis, dated 4th Quarter 06. You're correct, in saying that the local office market isn't that strong, with vacancy at 18.32% (before the Met Life departure), but that's pretty typical with the national standard, and it drops to 10.57% with Class A office. So I think there is actually decent demand for high-end office space in Hartford, and that low percentage isn't due to a low inventory count.. in fact 72% of office inventory downtown is Class A space.

I think this is an idea that needs to be explored more from a financial standpoint by some developer, or the city. From a developer's standpoint, it looks attractive to build here given some public financing.. there's positive office absorption, decreasing vacancy, and increasing rates. You have plenty of large corporations to lure in to potentially the best office space in the city..just off the top of my head: United Technologies, Aetna, The Hartford, Travelers, Phoenix, Mass Mutual, and other larger offices like ING, Lincoln Financial Group, Cigna, and the multitude of middle-market insurers, lenders, and bank groups.

[HartfordTycoon]

In the current situation some corporate tenants still see value to being located Downtown while others do not. I think what we are currently focused on, increasing the residential and entertainment factors, is the only way to lure businesses back in the long term. The business sector will either remain stagnant or further decline unless Downtown Hartford becomes truly desireable. Not just to city enthusiasts, but for everyone based on the merit of it being a great place. I don't see much movement on the corporate front until that goal is realized.