The first tenant has moved into 550 W. Adams St., the last major office building scheduled to open downtown for a few years.
Humana Health Plan Inc., which moved in last weekend, occupies 55,282 square feet in the 18-story, Class A West Loop midrise, said Rick Cavenaugh, president of Fifield Realty Corp., which developed the project in a joint venture with CB Richard Ellis Strategic Partners LP.
“Hopefully, it’ll be 90 percent leased in about two weeks,” Cavenaugh said of the glass-clad building across from Union Station, where gross asking rents range from $35 to $40 a square foot a year.
Some law and financial-services firms have expressed interest in the 479,000-square-foot building, added Cavenaugh, who estimated the project’s development cost to be at least $125 million.
The anchor tenant in the building designed by DeStefano + Partners Ltd. is USG Corp., which is scheduled to move into its new 300,000-square-foot headquarters there in January.
Despite the abundance of space available in some downtown submarkets, Fifield is bullish on the sector of the West Loop west of the Chicago River. The building at 550 W. Adams is its fourth new office project there since 2000.
Indeed, Fifield is planning a 1 million-square-foot, two-building office complex nearby at 601 and 625 W. Monroe St.
“We’re searching for an anchor tenant,” said Tom Saletta, the principal in charge of leasing. Then, Fifield will seek financing and city approval.
Saletta is confident that demand will remain strong. “It’s based on the transportation complex in the area and the efficient interior layout that gives tenants more usable space,” he said.
Lake Forest offices: Indianapolis-based Duke Realty Corp. is so pleased with the progress of a recent speculative office project in Lake Forest that it’s plunging into that north suburban market again, the real estate investment trust announced this week.
At Conway Park this winter, Duke will break ground on an approximately $20 million, three-story Class A building designed by Wright Architects Ltd. of Chicago.
More Top Picks Best Visual Timers For Autism
Gross average asking rents in the 100,000-square-foot building will be about $27 a square foot a year. The building should be ready for occupancy in December 2007, said Duke Vice President Steven Schnur.
“The north market is currently the Chicago area’s strongest suburban submarket,” said Schnur, who estimates that about 7 percent of the office space there is available for direct lease.
Two weeks ago Duke started construction on a 138,000-square-foot office building in the same park. Announced as a speculative project in April, it was fully leased to Hospira Inc., a Lake Forest-based health-care products firm, before shovel hit earth.
Conway Park, where development started in the 1980s, has about a dozen buildings, and Duke’s latest project will take the last available site, Schnur said.
Jones Lang foray: Going fishing in Florida for multifamily rental properties, Jones Lang LaSalle Inc. is expanding its investment sales staff in Orlando and Miami.
“In the next few years they’ll help us roll out a national multifamily rental investment sales practice,” explained Earl Webb, chief executive of capital markets for Jones Lang. Previously focused on office and retail properties, the Chicago-based real estate firm will now zero in on apartment buildings.
“We’re seeing a shaky condo market with rising interest rates, demand declining slightly and fewer apartment buildings being converted into condos,” Webb said. “That’s driving institutional investor demand into the apartment sector.”
———-