Commercial Real Estate Spotlight
Business to Business Monthly Magazine
Date -- September, 2001 - By Bill Milliken, CCIM
Ann Arbor Area Chamber of Commerce
Undaunted by talk in some circles of a "slowdown" in the real estate market, Thomas B. McMullen & Company's Valley Ranch is a hotbed of commercial construction activity. Crews are at work this month on over 50,000 square feet of new Class A office space in multiple buildings in this southwest Ann Arbor business park.
Summit Office CenterThe Summit Office Center is a 33,600 square foot "spec" development on Oak Valley Drive. McMullen & Company has sold some of the parcels in Valley Ranch to other developers, but Summit Office Center is being built on four acres - and will be owned and managed - by McMullen for its own account.Hobbs & Black Architects, which has a long working relationship with the company, provided the architectural services. The rental rate, according to leasing manager Randy Maas, is $15 per square foot, plus taxes and operating expenses (net charges). Tenants may also receive a build-out allowance of up to $30 per square foot for their office improvements. Completed suites at Summit Office Center should be available for tenants by November. Maas notes that the minimum office size will be 5,000 square feet, and that a five-year lease term will be required.
Kidney Foundation BuildingThe National Kidney Foundation of Michigan, which has outgrown its headquarters on Huron Parkway in Ann Arbor, hopes to relocate to Valley Ranch by next spring. A ground breaking for their 12,000 square foot office is scheduled this month.Rand Construction Engineering of Brighton, MI, which has built a number of office buildings in Valley Ranch, is providing design-build services for the Foundation. The Kidney Foundation employs twenty people in Ann Arbor, and maintains field offices in Detroit, Lansing and Grand Rapids.
Arbor Business ParkThe new Meijer's retail complex on Jackson Boulevard, west of Ann Arbor, is a bellwether for the level of real estate sophistication that is being brought to bear on that commercial corridor.Mindful of the office space demand that may be generated in Scio Township, Rand Construction Engineering has announced the development of Arbor Business Park, a 20-acre business park at Jackson Road and Baker Road. Rand purchased the acreage seven months ago, and has engaged Atwell Hicks, Inc. for site and engineering work. Zoned Research, Office, Industrial (ROI) by the Township, it is now drawn as five separate parcels that range from three to eight acres. Utilities have been brought to the site, including public water and sewer.
"We plan a "spec" office building at [Arbor Business] Park next spring," says Andrew Klein, Rand Construction's president. The architect and the size of the building are yet to be determined. However, they will be steel-framed structures on a concrete slab with brick finishes. Land at the park will also be offered for sale.
Klein says no pricing has been established, yet, but that he expects to have pricing by the time construction begins and that it will be market competitive.
Bowers & Rein To MoveAll those changes in the banking industry played well for Ann Arbor's Bower & Rein Associates, an architectural, planning and design firm. They acquired the former TCF Bank site at 2401 S. Huron Parkway last year, and a long, painful conversion of the building is nearing an end. The firm plans to move from Ann Arbor Research Park at the end of this month. The 3,300 square foot building, whose sixties heritage was unmistakable, has undergone an extensive renovation that includes construction of an arched, structural steel-framed skylight feature above the roofline, and a lower level with a full glass wall overlooking Huron Parkway.
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Bill Milliken, CCIM
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