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H-Town Man

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H-Town Man last won the day on December 15 2020

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  1. This article may shed some light. I waited to post it so as not to rain on the parade or be accused of undue pessimism. After ten years of heady growth, the biotech sector is now contracting rather than expanding, with one index of biotech stocks showing a 48% decline from two years ago and many companies struggling to survive. The upswing in interest rates the last couple years chased investors out of biotech as it did tech in general. Probably not the time to be a new, unproven biotech city trying to capture some of the overflow from the core biotech centers. https://www.wsj.com/articles/layoffs-and-shutdowns-hit-biotech-industry-in-u-turn-ffdf14eb?page=3
  2. Are you sure that they want 40,000 SF floor plates? Very strange to build back-office space in the most expensive submarket in the city where land values are so high. Also very strange that they would move all their downtown workers from Class A space typical of a CBD to back-office space on large floorplates. As to why they want new build rather than some of the existing vacant space in central Dallas, most of which is from the 70's-80's, I'd say that is pretty easy and follows the trend we've seen of well-heeled companies preferring new space over 80's vintage.
  3. The first link didn't work for me and I am blocked on the second one, I guess because I am not part of the dallasmetropolis forum. 40,000 SF floor plates would be huge, typical of back office space. Most office towers are in the 20,000 to 25,000 SF range. Their current office at Trammell Crow Center has 24,124 SF floor plates.
  4. I said it would be "exceedingly unusual" for an anchor tenant to be the only tenant in an office tower, which is different from saying that single-tenant office buildings in any location whatsoever are exceedingly unusual. The word "tower" in my post, and the fact that we were talking about a downtown location, are important context. You then quoted a bunch of examples of single-tenant office buildings, almost all of which were suburban buildings: "State Farm, Liberty Mutual, ConocoPhillips, Marathon, Occidental in The Woodlands, Hess, come to mind)." The "come to mind" was a nice touch, since the list was probably the product of furious googling, like most of what you post on this forum. But I should go easy on you, since it probably didn't even occur to you that suburban vs. downtown location made a difference in likely tenancy. I've asked you already to give us a link to a site plan if you have in fact seen one. Can you link the site plan for us please? Was this information not already on the site plan that you've seen? Why didn't you mention it before?
  5. Single-tenant office buildings are fairly rare in downtown areas, which is what we're talking about. The three examples I named in downtown Houston illustrate that point, unless there is just a ton of others I'm forgetting. So you're basically using the rendering to say that the DMN reporter was wrong when he said that the office building could be up to 80 stories. That's fine. Just wanted to clarify.
  6. Like I said, multi-tenancy is normal for downtown office buildings, single-tenancy is much more common in suburban corporate campuses. The Chevron and Hess buildings are about the only single-tenant buildings I can think of in downtown Houston, besides government buildings. Hilcorp is another. Please confirm if you have other info on this besides just the unlabeled rendering in the article. You seem positive this won't be 80 stories.
  7. I think you are failing to distinguish between what is normal for suburban corporate campuses (single-tenancy) and what is normal for downtown office buildings (multi-tenancy). Goldman Sachs is currently the anchor tenant at the Trammell Crow Center, where they have 200,000 SF in a building of 1.2 million SF. Although it is possible that they could want a single-tenant building, it is also quite possible (if not likely) that they would have a situation similar to their current one of being the anchor tenant in a larger building. When you say "site plans released by the developer," do you mean the rendering? A site plan typically shows building footprints within a site boundary. If you know of a site plan, can you link it?
  8. What I read (and I am paywall-blocked from the whole article) said "offices with as many as 80 floors." Your guess of a 40-story tower with 800,000 SF for Goldman Sachs assumes that they would be the only tenant in the tower, which is exceedingly unusual. Typically an anchor tenant takes 25% to 50% of a tower, although there are no hard and set rules. Other tenants will want to be in the same tower as Goldman Sachs, including those that do business with them, those that are drawn to the prestige of their name, and those who simply want to be in Dallas' newest highrise. If a lender or equity partner sees Goldman Sachs taking 800k SF, they wouldn't bat an eyelash at signing on to a much larger building.
  9. Hunt Realty Investments is planning an 11-acre development called North End, located between Victory and the Woodall Rogers freeway. The development will include office, hotel, and residential towers, with the tallest office tower potentially anchored by an 800,000 SF lease to Goldman Sachs. The tower could rise as high as 80 stories. Kohn Pederson Fox has drawn initial plans for the development. Dallas City Council approved $18 million in incentives for Goldman Sachs yesterday, which is choosing between Dallas and a few other cities for the new office, although Dallas already has their second-largest office after New York. Most of the employees for the new office would come from that office. https://www.dallasnews.com/business/real-estate/2022/06/10/goldman-sachs-office-tower-near-downtown-dallas-will-be-the-largest-in-a-generation/ https://www.dallasnews.com/business/real-estate/2022/06/22/goldman-sachs-would-bring-5000-jobs-to-new-dallas-office/
  10. I like Lake Flato, but this architecture is just too horizontal, too compressed. I know, I know, the University of St. Thomas campus is similarly horizontal and compressed, as is the Menil. Why do I love UST but am not excited about this? I don't know. Maybe it's the brick. A traditional material should have a more traditional design. This reminds me of those buildings from the 50's that you used to see on your college campus and think, "When are they going to tear that stuff down?"
  11. But the County suit gets nowhere without the White House. I blame: 1. County 2. White House 3. City 4. Sheila 5. TxDOT, for being inflexible
  12. I generally agree with you up to the point where you say that if the County hadn't sued, somebody else would have. The County suing is a pretty big deal. I also seem to recall Sylvester Turner being involved in some way. I doubt the County sues if he takes a strong stand in favor. As for Biden & Co., they are going to follow the lead of local politicians if the politicians are Democrat. If the County is against something and the City is "leading from behind" with the County, the White House delivers the kibosh. If the lawsuit is just from some ragtag coalition but local Democrat politicians are saying, "No, we need this project to happen or it's our necks," the White House doesn't get involved.
  13. Well, after George Floyd happened, any public works project that could remotely be construed as racist became a political fireball. The framing of the argument that brought the lawsuit on, as I remember it, was that it "disproportionately impacts minorities." In a post-George Floyd world, that meant the project was dead.
  14. George W. Bush did not appoint John Culberson. In fact, I think he once brokered a meeting at the White House between Kay Bailey Hutchison and Tom DeLay, when DeLay was trying to use congressional power to kill the original Main Street line while it was under construction and Hutchison was trying to talk some sense into him and protect the city. Bush generally came down on Hutchison's side and the result of the meeting was to calm DeLay down and let the project go on. I am just going from memory on this and could have a detail or two wrong. I also think you're missing the biggest ingredient in galvanizing all of these politicians into stopping the NHHIP: George Floyd.
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