Category Archives: Boston Investment Properties

0 Rent Boston Office Space by the Month

Posted on by
LiquidSpace

LiquidSpace

Office space in major markets is now available on an hour, daily or monthly plan.  If you’re a startup, pick your market and pick your plan.

From Globest:

LiquidSpace has launched monthly rentals, enabling those startups and growing teams to rent a primary office space by the month. Monthly space is available in San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles, Orange County and Boston, with plans to roll out monthly office space across the global LiquidSpace network by the end of 2015. LiquidSpace has had its sights on expanding into monthly space for a while, but it considered how to accomplish that in a way that improves on the traditional approach while also extending a new, flexible option for building owners to monetize the excess space.

Mark Gilbreath, founder and CEO of LiquidSpace, tells GlobeSt.com: “We’ve definitely struck a chord with both building owners and occupiers who have vacant space to share. Millions of square feet of small, high quality office spaces sit idle, robbing owners of potential revenue and asset value growth.  Now for the first time, there is a simple and cost-effective way to monetize these 500- to 5000-square- foot spaces, by connecting directly to growing startups and corporate occupiers with satellite teams.”

LiquidSpace allows landlords and tenants to list space online on an hourly, daily or monthly basis, with LiquidSpace taking a 10% cut of monthly rents, providing differing rates for daily and hourly leases. The LiquidSpace network allows space providers to create and manage custom profiles as well as communicate directly with growing companies and manage all aspects of a transaction.

0 Older Office Buildings in Boston Yielding Higher Rent Prices

Posted on by
office space at 10 Post office square in Boston

Credit: Boston Globe

It is true, Class B office rents are on par with the low rise space in class a towers.

From the Boston Globe:

What they lack in modern conveniences, the Class B buildings make up in character: Many have exposed bricks and beams or ornate stairways and other finishings that have caught the eye of young technology companies and other startups looking for more authentic digs.

Vacancy rates for those buildings have been consistently below those of the more modern, taller downtown towers, something unheard of in previous decades, according to JLL, a Chicago commercial real estate firm with offices in Boston.

Rents at Class B buildings in downtown Boston have increased about 32 percent over the past three years, compared with 18 percent for space in Class A towers, according to Cushman & Wakefield.

Related Office Listings
Boston Commercial Real Estate

0 Copley Place Upgrades Planned

Posted on by
Copley Square updates

Credit: Bisnow

Copley Square is going to see some major upgrade to Copley Place.  Simon Properties in planning major interior and exterior upgrades with completion in the Summer of ’16.

Bisnow is reporting that, “come September, Copley Place begins both interior and exterior upgrades. Simon Malls president David Contis says the high-end shopping destination will have a more modern and cohesive look. Simon expects to add a number of luxury retailers. Copley Place will remain open during renovations, with the majority of the project expected to be completed by summer 2016.”

You can read the original post, here.

 

0 John Hancock II Planned for 380 Stuart Street in Back Bay

Posted on by
rendering of new john hancock_tower at 380 Stuart Street

Credit: Boston Business Journal

The John Hancock tower Version 2.0 is being planned for 380 Stuart Street in Back Bay.

An article on the BBJ outlines the “six things you need to know about the tower proposal;” here are a few excerpts from the Boston Business Journal’s report:

  • What’s being proposed: A 625,000-square-foot, 26-story tower with street-level retail and cafe space and 175 underground parking spaces. The tower would top out at 380 feet.

  • Where would the tower go: 380 Stuart St., which is home to a nine-story, 140,000-square-foot office that dates back to 1924 and houses John Hancock Financial Services employees.

  • Who would go in: John Hancock envisions “owner-occupancy and commercial office” tenants using the space.

  • How would it be financed: John Hancock, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of Canadian financial services firm Manulife Financial (NYSE: MFC), would finance the building in its entirety.

  • Who’s leading development:Colliers International is the project manager representing John Hancock. The architects are Chicago-based Skidmore Owings Merrill and Boston-based CBT Architects.

  • What’s the project timeline: If approved, construction would start in late 2016, and the tower would be complete in early 2019.

 

0 Boston’s Untracked Development Tax Breaks

Posted on by

Much time and energy is spent discussing property taxes in the city of Boston. I firmly believe if the city is offering any tax concession then they should track them and be accountable for giving them.  By no means should we stop them, rather let’s have a better understanding of how they’re used to benefit the greater good.

Boston development property tax breaks in a map

Credit: Boston Globe

From the Boston Globe:

A Globe review found that city records are incomplete for most of the tax breaks the city awarded during the past four decades. It appears that only recently did the city begin to project how much deals would cost taxpayers.

City Hall could provide cost projections for only 10 major tax deals signed since 2008, totalling an estimated $78 million in lost tax revenue. These include the $9.7 million awarded for the new State Street Corp. office and adjacent garage on A Street, and $7.8 million for the bottom floors of a tower planned for land next to TD Garden.

After the Globe inquired about the city’s incomplete records, the Walsh administration pledged that it would keep better track of the costs of tax deals, almost all of which were signed by previous mayoral administrations.

 

0 BRA Approves Six Office Building Projects in Boston

Posted on by
redering of Boston's Congress Sq.

Credit: Boston Globe

Six buildings in Boston’s Financial District, Congress Square, are set for complete renovation by Related Beal.

According to the Boston Globe, the BRA approved six projects in total, “the agency gave the go-ahead to some $515.6 million in development…One of the biggest projects is Congress Square, the renovation of an entire city block of buildings in the Financial District, between Congress and Water streets. Developer Related Beal plans to turn six office buildings into a boutique hotel, new housing, and office space…Also approved was Clippership Wharf, which would put 492 apartments and condos on 12 acres on the waterfront in East Boston. Developer Lend Lease plans to move forward on the long-stalled project and won approval to add housing units and subtract parking spaces from a plan approved in 2003.”

You can read the full article on the Boston Globe, here.

0 Can the Supply of Office Space in Boston Keep up with Demand?

Posted on by
office buildings in boston on the waterfront

Credit: Banker&Tradesman

The Boston market will continue to grow through 2018.  How will this affect office pricing in the years to come?

From Banker&Tradesman:

“The challenge you have in the city of Boston is: do we create too much supply and get to a point where we’re not seeing rent growth?” said Mitchell Roschelle, PwC’s national practice head of real estate advisory. “We heard this quarter in the survey a little bit of concern on the part of some investors about the new supply to the market. How that supply performs is going to dictate whether we see investors flooding the market with capital.”

The tenant retention rate was 68 percent in the first quarter with landlords offering an average of five months of free rent, according to the survey. Cap rates averaged 5.7 percent in the Boston central business district and 7.2 percent in the suburbs. Boston is one of 32 U.S. office markets expected to remain in expansion phase in 2015, the PwC report said, with employment generating demand for office space outpacing new supply…San Francisco, which shares many of Boston’s market characteristics, is expected to contract in 2015 and enter a recession mode with negative rental growth in 2017.

0 News Office and Retail Space Added to Fort Point Project

Posted on by
Boston wharf road

22 Boston Wharf Rd.
(Click to view property details)

More new office space and retail is on the drawing board from Berkeley Investments at 22 Boston Wharf Road.

According to the Boston Business Journal, “Berkeley Investments has plans to add two office floors atop the Stillings Street parking garage….[along with proposing] street-level retail to Boston Wharf Road, which is a relatively short connecting road between Congress Street and Seaport Boulevard, as well as additional windows along the side of the building that abuts the Q Street park.”

The BBJ’s overview of the Fort Point project also notes, “the 241,124-square-foot property has an assessed value of $26.435 million this fiscal year, according to the city assessor. Berkeley acquired it in 2004 as part of a $97.05 million acquisition of a swath of Fort Point properties from Boston Wharf Co., a Suffolk County deed shows.”

The full BBJ article is available on its website, here.

0 Boston Experiencing Historic Commercial Building Boom

Posted on by
rendering of office tower at Belvidere and Dalton East

Credit: Boston Globe

The Boston skyline is on the move.  A Boston Globe editorial notes, “Boston is in the midst of a building boom never seen in its history, with an influx of new residents and companies giving rise to skyscraping towers, thousands of homes, and retail businesses that are redefining commercial districts citywide.” The Globe followed the article with a list of 50 of the largest development projects organized by expected square feet.

Among these office developments are projects at the Government Center Garage, South Station air rights, Tremont Crossing, and Landmark Center in Fenway.

Jump over to the Globe to read through its complete list of the top Boston Office Developments in progress.

 

0 Tech Startup Progresses Architectural Renderings

Posted on by
iphone app for architects and real estate developers

Credit: BBJ

What will it look like? That’s the question so many property owners and developers face when first envisioning a renovation, and  thanks to Terrence Masson of  Building Conversation, we will soon be able to get a much clearer idea.  The company will allow architects and others to visualized a proposed building within the context of its surroundings.

“It does that through the camera of an iPad or iPhone which acts as a “window,” on top of which architectural design proposals are overlaid. This technology is known as augmented reality, which offers users a live view of a real-world environment combined with elements that are computer-generated,” according to a Bizjournals.com posting.

“In effect, you get to see and walk around a full-scale hologram of the proposed architecture through the iPad,” said Building Conversation’s CEO Terrence Masson, who founded the company with George Thrush, the director of the School of Architecture at Northeastern University…Masson started working on the technology as part of a Capstone project at Northeastern about three years ago.

You can read the full article on BizJournals.