Date: 8/15/14
ENI Petroleum, one of the largest public oil companies hired us to find a tenant for 75,000 SF of vacant office space in one of the largest Class A Office Towers in New Orleans. At the time, businesses were moving out of New Orleans and none wanted this much space nor the private office layout. We leased the space for use as a hotel, saving our client $2,500,000.
ENI Petroleum, ranked among the top10 largest oil companies was involved in a merger and relocated all their New Orleans employees to Houston, leaving 57,000 SF on 3 floors vacant in one of the few Class A downtown New Orleans office towers but they were still paying $250,000 annually in rent due to a long term lease. ENI was concerned about conflicts of interest, having previously hired a listing broker for one of their vacant spaces who steered the prospect to another of the broker’s listings rather than ENI’s space.
ENI hired us because we promise no conflicts of interest and do not accept clients that compete. Clients never have to worry that prospects will be shown a competing space. We immediately launched a marketing campaign since ENI was paying rent on 75,000 SF of vacant space they were not using. At that time, the only tenants that needed a full floor of private offices were law firms, and none had leases expiring. A few technology firms were coming into New Orleans to take advantage of the payroll tax credits, but none wanted private office layouts, preferring to have open spaces encouraging collaboration, with game rooms and lounges rather than conference rooms.
After researching the market for the highest and best use, we reached out to a select target market and produced several interested tenants, but decided to lease the space to nearby Hyatt Hotel owner to be redeveloped as a boutique hotel, requiring months of strategic negotiation directly with the Hyatt franchisee. Even though our client was one of the largest public companies with their own real estate department, they trusted our marketing strategy and advice. This successful lease stands today as one of the largest negotiated leases for Class A office towers in New Orleans.
