Commercial real estate giant JLL announced plans to purchase Peloton Commercial Real Estate Thursday. The merger will effectively pull Peloton’s Dallas and Houston offices into JLL’s agency leasing and property management business lines. Ricky Bautista, Unsplash Downtown Dallas As part of the merger, more than 130 Peloton employees will be joining JLL. The acquisition is expected to close in the next few weeks, with Peloton co-founding partners Joel Pustmueller and T.D. Briggs and JLL’s Jeff Eckert leading the statewide integration efforts. Pustmueller and Briggs will work directly with the Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston offices while Eckert will oversee Austin, San Antonio, and Dallas-Fort Worth as the teams integrate. Peloton Property Management partner John Myers will be named regional leader of property management for DFW. “This is a momentous step in our journey to become a market-leading player in Texas,” said David Carroll, JLL market director for the South Central Region. “With the exceptional growth we have seen in those markets, Peloton’s position as a leading provider of leasing and property management services will greatly enhance our business capabilities and breadth of services. Just as importantly, we look forward to working with a team of professionals that share JLL’s strong commitment to collaboration and culture.” JLL has a long history of growing via mergers and acquisitions, including closing the $2B acquisition of HFF July 1. One of its most notable acquisitions in Texas was bringing The Staubach Co., led by Dallas Cowboys elite quarterback Roger Staubach, into its fold in 2008. Peloton is a leasing and property management firm that launched in 2002. It manages or leases more than 25M SF for clients.
Martin, Disiere, Jefferson & Wisdom, which has been a tenant in downtown Houston’s historic Esperson Building since the law firm was founded in 2000, expanded its footprint to 42,000 square feet, according to real estate brokerage Newmark Knight Frank.
Common Desk, a Dallas-based coworking company, leased 29,093 square feet at 3040 Post Oak in the Lakes on Post Oak near the Galleria for its second Houston location. Ryan Barbles and Mathew Volz of Stream Realty Partners represented the landlord, MetLife Investment Management.
Common Desk, which offers an all-inclusive model in its monthly membership, recently leased 25,000 square feet in The Block, a warehouse redevelopment project at 2339 Canal St. in the East End for its Houston debut in late summer 2020. The Galleria location, which is planned to open in early fall 2020, will offer its Fiction Coffee in-house brand, custom art, and finishes throughout the space, private offices for growing teams, hospitality suites for enterprise users and full-service workspace amenities.
Martin Disiere Jefferson & Wisdom expanded and extended its lease for 42,000 square feet at downtown’s historic Esperson Building. The law firm, which previously occupied 39,000 square feet on four floors, consolidated to two floors that have been built out with a traditional yet modern design. Reginald Beavan III and Joshua Brown of Newmark Knight Frank represented the tenant, while Cameron Management represented the landlord in-house. The Houston-based law firm, which has other offices in Dallas, Austin, and San Antonio, has been a tenant of the Esperson Building since it was founded in 2000.
MobisoftInfotech leased 3,998 square feet at 1811 Bering Drive. Larry Vickers of Tarantino Properties represented the landlord. William McCarthy with Finial Group represented the tenant.
Craters & Freighters renewed a 14,165-square-foot industrial lease at 6100 West by Northwest Blvd. Chris Caudill of NAI Partners represented the tenant. Boone Smith and Garret Geaccone with Stream Realty represented the landlord, Agellan Commercial REIT.
Protec Equipment Resources, a provider of sales and rentals of electrical test and measurement equipment, leased an 8,000-square-foot building at 14251 Gulfstream Park Drive in Webster. Coe Parker of Cushman & Wakefield represented the landlord, Enviro Building Systems. Melissa Gerber Brams of Gerber Realty represented the tenant.
Dover Precision Components, a provider of products used in rotating and reciprocating equipment, is constructing a nearly 12,000-square-foot Innovation Lab in Pearland’s Lower Kirby District, according to the Pearland Economic Development Corp. The facility, just north of the company’s 150,000-square-foot manufacturing and operations center at Spectrum Boulevard and Hooper Road, will open in the second quarter of 2020.
Capital Title of Texas has leased 3,000 square feet of office space at 27008 Northwest Freeway, Cypress, from Cymill Partners. Ashley Strickland and Nick Ramsey of NewQuest Properties represented the landlord. Adam McAlpine of McAlpine Interests represented the tenant.
Lake Management Services, a company specializing in the construction, consulting and maintenance of lakes and ponds, leased 15,300 square feet of industrial space at 4318 Bluebonnet Drive. Jake Wilkinson and Chris Caudill of NAI Partners represented the tenant. Clay Pritchett of NAI Partners represented the landlord, Martinez A&M Investments.
Southern Reformed Seminary purchased a 2-acre property with 7,500 square feet of buildings at 26111 Beckendorff Road, Katy. The seminary plans to relocate from its current location off Dacoma and U.S. 290 in northwest Houston. Keith Towne of Re/Max Metro represented the seller. Ashley Casterlin of Davis Commercial represented the buyer.
Gridforce Energy Management leased 12,702 square feet at 1301 Fannin. John Luck, Joshua Brown, Reggie Beavan III and Andy Iversen of Newmark Knight Frank represented the tenant.
Premier Construction & Development purchased a 1.38-acre tract at Shadow Creek Parkway and Kingsley Drive, Pearland. Brad LyBrand and Brad Elmore of NewQuest Properties represented the seller, A-S 143 SC Ranch LP.
Domain Communities, a Houston-based multifamily firm founded by James D. Golden, purchased the 300-unit Iron Rock Ranch apartments in Austin. John Fenoglio of CBRE arranged to finance from New York-based MF1.
The Woodlands Towers at The Waterway The year for Houston’s commercial real estate sector ended with a bang as The Howard Hughes Corp. announced a $565M deal with Occidental Petroleum to purchase the company’s two Class-A office towers, warehouse space and land in The Woodlands and a 63-acre Energy Corridor campus. All told, the deal included 2.7M SF across three sites. What exactly Occidental Petroleum, commonly known as Oxy, would do regarding its real estate footprint in the wake of its $57B acquisition of Anadarko Petroleum in August has been the source of much speculation. Howard Hughes said Oxy will maintain occupancy at The Woodlands Towers, formerly Anadarko’s HQ. Oxy’s Century Park Campus in the Energy Corridor, a 17-building complex, will immediately be remarketed, in line with the firm’s recently announced commitment to sell noncore properties. The Howard Hughes Corp., which recently announced its HQ would be moving to The Woodlands, has settled on a new office and will be relocating its corporate headquarters into the approximately 595K SF tower at 9950 Woodloch Forest Drive. The company owns the master-planned community The Woodlands and nearby communities Bridgeland and The Woodlands Hills. The deal bolsters the firm’s office portfolio by 50%. Oxy was represented by CBRE’s Brandon Clarke, Jared Chua, and Steve Hesse.
The top three brokerages on the Houston Business Journal’s Largest Houston-area Commercial Real Estate Brokerage Firms List have stayed the same since 2015, each increasing it’s total employed licensed professionals.
CBRE Group Inc., No. 1 on The List, increased its total local professionals by about 53.7 percent over the course of five years, from 119 in 2014 to 183 in 2018. The brokerage peaked in 2017 when it had 213 licensed professionals.
Meanwhile, Transwestern, No. 2, saw a consistent increase in employed license professionals across a five-year period, with 110 in 2014 and 146 in 2018 — around a 32.7 percent increase.
JLL, No. 3, went from 73 licensed professionals in 2014 to 107 in 2018, which is about a 46.5 percent increase.
Colliers International placed No. 4 on the List in 2015 and 2016; however, it dropped to No. 6 in 2017 before moving back to and holding No. 4 by 2018. PM Realty Group was in the top five from 2015 to 2017 before dropping to No. 7 in 2018, when it was acquired by Washington, D.C.-based Madison Marquette. The combined firm now ranks No. 12.
Since 2015, Newmark Knight Frank jumped from the No. 10 spot to its current No. 5 spot.
Walker & Dunlop, a commercial real estate finance company, has 29 offices in the U.S. The company has opened a Houston office.
Walker & Dunlop, a commercial real estate finance company based in Bethesda, Md., has opened a Houston office staffed with a team of debt and equity finance professionals formerly with JLL.
Mike Melody, Tom Melody, Tom Fish, and Paul House, all managing directors, and Jonathan Paine, senior vice president, will be responsible for securing financing for owners and developers of all types of commercial real estate assets in the southwestern United States.
“Each member of the team has deep relationships with commercial real estate lenders and owners across the country, and we are thrilled that they will bring such an impressive track record to Walker & Dunlop,” Cliff Carnes, chief production officer for Walker & Dunlop, said in an announcement. “Their long history of raising debt and equity capital for multifamily, office, industrial, retail and hospitality properties across the country will add to the depth and strength of the overall platform.”
The announcement comes about one month after JLL gained a number of capital markets professionals in Houston and elsewhere through the acquisition of Dallas-based HFF.
Melody, Melody, and Fish headed JLL’s national Capital Markets-Finance platform, while House oversaw the Houston Capital Markets platform. The 10-person Walker & Dunlop Houston office will include five staff members to support the group’s efforts and continued expansion.
“We have a 30-year history with the leadership team at Walker & Dunlop and are very honored to be continuing that relationship as part of the W&D family,” Fish said. “The small, ‘family business’ mentality that the company embodies, paired with its big company capabilities is truly unmatched. Our collective experience as a team is a point of pride for us and we are excited to become key components of the growth and success of this company.”
Walker & Dunlop’s debt brokerage team closed nearly 600 transactions in 2018, working with capital providers such as banks, life insurance companies and commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) conduits. The company has 29 offices with more than 700 professionals across the U.S.