Why build a skyscraper in Philly?
Glenn Blumenfeld of Tactix is up against tough numbers
Why build a skyscraper in Philly?
Joseph N. DiStefano
Why would a company or landlord spend the estimated $500/sq. ft. (SF) it would cost to build a new high-rise office tower in Philadelphia, when it could buy serviceable Class A buildings for a quarter or a third of that cost, or lease space for maybe 5% as much per year?
"For a company looking for something new, green and transfomative, they may pay extra," insists Glenn D. Blumenfeld, of the Radnor office of Tactix Real Estate Advisors LLC.
He's in the business of selling corporate tenants on new space, and is busy these talking to the handful of big companies known or rumored to be looking for big space in town. See if he can convince you: "First, many companies are consuming a lot less space per employee, so they can usually generate meaningful efficiencies if they've been in their current space for 10 years or more." See, for example, GlaxoSmithKline, which just shed a complex that once covered 800,000 SF south of the Parkway museum district, for a new 205,000 SF Liberty Property Trust building at the ex-Navy Yard in South Philly. "Second" is what our philosophical friends might call the Dialectical or Counter-intuitive Argument: "Rental rates for the better buildings in town are in the $30s now," which is so low (vs. New York, Washington or Boston) that it's driving office landlords to convert properties to apartments, which means "office supply is contracting, thereby bolstering rents." This is particularly happening in University City, the highest-rent office neighborhood in Philadelphia, where "the growth of our universities and health care systems (has resulted in the schools) freeing up space on their land-constrained campuses by moving admins nad office folks into office buildings in Center City." Indeed, Drexel, Penn and CHoP have all acquired new properties east of the Schuylkill -- even as "non-household-name companies" are paying high rents just to be in UCity near the hospital and U headquarters. "Also consider that Philly is an incredibly cheap office market." For Comcast to lease another Comcast Center-type property in New York (in case newly-obtained Rockefeller Center isn't enough), "they'd be paying rents above $150/sq ft." And there's just that certain-something that makes a cool neighborhood worth the extra cash -- see for instance the Navy Yard, with Glaxo and Urban Outfitters and other new tenants: "Certainly (those firms) could have found cheaper existing space in the suburbs... Why did they do it? They are getting a unique campus environment with a hip urban feel" and low-rise construction.
"Our city is cheap when it comes right down to it" -- yet there are "not a lot of good blocks of 200,000 SF out there." Convinced?
Why doesn't Comcast sell the Rockefeller Center and fire all NBC, CNBC and MSNBC "news people" and hire a "conservative news" staff and compete against Fox News Channel while broadcasting from Philadelphia?
Comcast could also help us weed out the corrupt Democrats and Union bosses that have ruined Philadelphia for many decades. Let's also get Comcast to help lower the city wage tax to 2% this year. The time is right... let's do this.— BFlint- Because Comcast is run by limousine liberal Democrats. Democrats = Party of Comcast.
- One, no one is able to compete against Faux at its own game. Two, news should not have a conservative tilt or really any tilt, it should just report the truth. — flavious27
- Yeah, falvious, news should not have any tilt. But it does. It amazes me how you "tolerant, open minded" liberals go apoplectic over Fox News, a single outlet, when your crowd has ABC, NBC, CBS, NBC, CNN, MSNBC, Al Gorezeera, PBS, NY Times, Washington Times, Inquirer, Daily News, etc. I guess it's the totalitarian tendency of the left...
- Sir, you are a NEW KIND of MORON. THEY ARE ALL CENTER. FOX IS FOR MORONIC PATHETIC LEECHES LIKE YOU
AND It's "Jazeera" idiot.— tynol10 - PRECISELY WHAT NBC AND ABC AND CBS DO VERY WELL. FOX IS MADE UP GARBAGE. — tynol10
- Show me where Fox has lied.
Unlike ABC, NBC, CBS and MSNBC who have all been caught in lies recently...whether it's editing audiotape (911 calls) or editing videotape, they have lied but no one ever gives me an examples of Fox lying. Time to put up.— mephisto - If NBC was doing well, why did GE dump them after owning them for 50 years? NBC is a total mess. — Dutch-wayne
- "conservative news"
That's an oxymoron. Much like "honest Republican" and "corporations are people."— daxtremesolja - LoL...Dax, you live in a glass house with that statement!
— Professor1982 - Becase thats a pathetic and disgusting idea and there would be no real news outlets. Fox makes up their own garbage and only mindless moronic people think it's accurate, so that would essentially make our city look mindless and stupid. Fox lives in a bubble of some world that isn't ours. The news they have on there doesn't reflect whats actually happening.
So, Democrats are much better for our country, investing in infrastructure, the young children, embracing public education and clean energy and protecting voting rights. FOX destroys all this and wants to sell us out to oil companies and get rid of the black, the poor, the well informed. Comcast is a good company. It's good they aren't zombie BS news like FOX is. Philadelphia is the best city in the country and if it were run by gop it would collapse and everything would be lost except for sick people like yourself whom don't know what's factual.— tynol10 - Becase thats a pathetic and disgusting idea and there would be no real news outlets. Fox makes up their own garbage and only mindless moronic people think it's accurate, so that would essentially make our city look mindless and stupid. Fox lives in a bubble of some world that isn't ours. The news they have on there doesn't reflect whats actually happening.
So, Democrats are much better for our country, investing in infrastructure, the young children, embracing public education and clean energy and protecting voting rights. FOX destroys all this and wants to sell us out to oil companies and get rid of the black, the poor, the well informed. Comcast is a good company. It's good they aren't zombie BS news like FOX is. Philadelphia is the best city in the country and if it were run by gop it would collapse and everything would be lost except for sick people like yourself whom don't know what's factual.
LETS NOT DO THIS AND LETS NOT LISTEN TO TOWN IDIOTS LIKE BFLINT. FOX MAKES YOU LESS INFORMED.— tynol10 - I like it!— Booper
- Who would build a new skyscraper in Philadelphia?
Apparently no one.
And why should they? There are like 7 layers of business taxes, city wage tax, parking tax, and to top it off you have the privilege of dealing with the city unions. Then theres Liberty Property taking what little action there is down to their bunker at the Navy Yard.
I do have to applaud Brandywine for that amazing Cira Centre and I also like the Comcast Center but Liberty has since gone astray on us. Taking all the workers who should be supporting Center City restaurants,lunch spots and keeping center City vibrant down to the aforementioned life-sucking Navy Yard.
— argonne - This comment has been deleted.— Thor Steiner
