Office
How High Can They Go?
Investors pay top dollar to acquire premium office properties.
By Beth Mattson-Teig |
I
nvestors who are vying
for premium office properties are reaching deep into their wallets. The
$835 million paid for Chicago's 110-story, 4.4 million-square-foot
Sears Tower earlier this year seems like a bargain compared to the
record-setting $1.4 billion paid for the 50-story, 2 million-sf General
Motors Building in New York last year. Clearly, trophy office buildings
continue to command top dollar.
Office
investment sales activity in general has been red hot as private and
public investors alike scramble to find safe havens for capital in
light of Wall Street's instability. In fact, office building sales
prices still are climbing in many markets nationwide. For instance,
Boston reported record-high sales prices for the 12 months ending in
the first quarter, with central business district prices reaching as
high as $672 per square foot -- well above the $276 psf average,
according to Real Capital Analytics.
"We're
seeing record prices psf and record capitalization rates," says Harry
D. Miller, CCIM, SIOR, first vice president at CB Richard Ellis in
Houston. "The really upper-tier product garners a lot more interest,
because it appeals to broad-based private capital and institutions
alike, while smaller, less-quality property will not have as wide a
demand."
Median sales prices among
office transactions valued at $100 million and higher have continued to
climb every year for the past five years. Year-to-date through April,
office buildings in this category fetched median prices of $276.79 psf -- a 6.3 percent increase compared to 2003's $259.37 psf median price
and a 30 percent hike over 1999's $194.27 psf median, according to
Marcus & Millichap and CoStar Group.
Escalating
prices coupled with soft fundamentals, such as rising vacancies and
declining rents, are squeezing cap rates. "Cap rates are as low as I've
ever seen," says Eugene L. Bentley, CCIM, associate vice president at
Norris, Beggs & Simpson in Portland, Ore. Across the country, cap
rates average 7 percent for top properties. These low rates are a
function of the enormous amount of capital vying for properties,
inexpensive financing, and the limited number of properties on the sale
block, Bentley adds.
Limited supply has
driven prices higher in the Portland market. The 316,000-sf Robert
Dunkin Plaza sold in May for $69.8 million, or approximately $220 psf.
Built in the 1990s, the property brought in top dollar due to its high
occupancy and good location. The building is 95 percent occupied,
predominately by government tenants, and it is well situated on the
light rail line, Bentley says.
Market Outlook
The lack of for-sale trophy buildings is investors' biggest hurdle. "We
get people from all over stopping in our office on a weekly basis.
There is just not that much available, particularly high-grade
properties," Bentley says.
Despite
record prices, many owners are reluctant to sell because they can't
find good alternative investments. "It's an absolutely perfect time to
be a seller. The real question is what you are going to do with your
money," Bentley says.
Some investors are
circumventing the property shortage by scouting for trophy buildings in
secondary and tertiary markets. Not only are buyers finding properties,
but opportunities to find better deals exist. Cap rates on CBD office
towers in secondary markets average 9 percent -- more than 155 basis
points higher than major markets such as New York and Boston,
according to Real Capital Analytics.
Increased
investor interest is readily apparent in markets such as Houston,
which continues to see record-setting transaction volume. In the first
quarter, Houston reported 18 office transactions totaling more than 4
million square feet and $412 million. That pace is already ahead of
2003, which set a record with 51 transactions totaling $983 million and
11.4 million sf, according to CB Richard Ellis.
Best of the Best
It is no wonder premium buildings are getting top dollar. Many trophy
properties have maintained healthy occupancies and continue to demand
premium rents. For example, notable New York assets such as the General
Motors and Henri Bendel buildings command rents up to $100 psf.
Slumping
office markets have pushed some investors to opt only for these "best
of class" properties. "Buyers are really looking for the good assets
that are highly occupied with credit tenants," says James M. Brown,
CCIM, SIOR, president of Hawaii Commercial Real Estate in Honolulu.
The
Davies Pacific Center, a class A building in downtown Honolulu, sold
last year for approximately $57 million. At the time of the sale, the
property was about 87 percent occupied with noteworthy tenants such as
New York Life. The $163 psf price seemed high at the time, but prices
in the market have continued to climb for premium class A buildings
with good occupancies and high credit tenants, Brown says.
An
abundance of capital and intense competition has created an overheated
office investment market. "Investors are clamoring for trophy buildings
in New York City," says Craig C. Evans, CCIM, senior managing director
of Colliers ABR in New York. In Manhattan, office buildings reported
prices as high as $955 psf over the 12 months ending in March -- well
above the $329 psf average, according to Real Capital Analytics.
But
trophy properties are limited, and those that do hit the market quickly
are enmeshed in bidding wars. Miller recently represented the seller of
Four Oaks Place, a 400,000-sf, four-complex property in Houston. More
than 80 investors requested brochures, and the property attracted about
30 bidders -- two to three times the volume of a more typical market.
Honolulu's
Waterfront Plaza currently is on the market, and its final bid is
expected to be about 30 percent higher than anticipated, Brown says.
The class A building located at the CBD's edge includes 425,000 sf of
office space and 92,000 sf of retail. One factor that pushed up pricing
was intense competition. The property received 18 bids -- four or five
times the number of bidders in past sales. "Across the United States
there is just an enormous amount of capital chasing the top-quality
assets," Brown says.
The anticipated
rise in interest rates actually may help to spark more trophy property
sales activity in the year's last quarter and into 2005. "Now that
interest rates are starting to move, a lot of the fence sitters with
stabilized properties are going to start marketing their properties,"
Miller says. If interest rates begin to creep higher, it may be a sign
that prices are at or past their peak, which would encourage some
owners to sell.