Pallister Grove's plan to lease 176,000 feet at 400 Quillan for Wystan Holdings, written from the seat of the person holding the pen.
Buy your way back onto the sheetYour brief said it plainly, "we don't want a shiny lobby and a hope." So before we priced anything, we asked the people doing the crossing out what did it. Nobody walked over rent. At $33.50 it's the cheapest building on Quillan Avenue, and it's still losing.
1The landlord has only ever seen this building from the owner's side of the table. A leasing pitch normally opens with the broker's logo and a market chart. We opened on the sheet where the decision gets made, because the first thing we had to sell Wystan was how bad that seat looks from outside.
Six scores out of ten, the same six every tenant's broker uses in the cab. Spend enough and you climb. Spend everything and the rent starts working against you.
A arrive, L light, O outside, S systems, R ready, V value. Value is scored from asking rent by the same rule for every building. A tie goes to the building the broker already knows.
Lobby, terrace, systems and suites cost $21.0M, put you second at $37.25, and earn 13.0 percent. The windows take you to first for another $12.4M, and that money earns 8.0 percent while pushing rent to $39.00, a dollar over the budget on Thursday's sheet. Second place at $11.75 under The Ostrand is where tenants sign. Hold the windows until a full-floor tenant asks for them.
2The main fear on this deal is pouring capital into a dated building and still losing the tour. So the proposal's central object answers it directly, and it argues against our own easy upsell. A broker who tells a landlord not to spend $12.4M earns the right to ask for the other $21.0M.
3Each tick redraws the building because a landlord thinks in buildings and a lender thinks in numbers, and both are in the room. Ticks work like a broker's pen, so the page keeps its own language instead of borrowing a software control.
4Tenants see these buildings in a row, in one morning, and remember the last one against the three before it. So the set piece walks at sidewalk height, at tour pace, in the order a broker would book it. The building at the end reflects whatever the landlord ticked above.
A 180 by 116 foot plate with a 41-foot lease span suits people who need depth. Pick who you want on it, and we'll draw the seats. The count below comes from the desks on the drawing.
5Tour sheets get decided on headcount, so this is the question every tenant's broker asks first. We count seats from the drawing itself rather than quoting a ratio, which is the same test fit we'd send a broker the morning after a tour.
Nobody on Quillan Avenue under $49 has a good place to take a client outside. We'd tell one story on every flyer and every tour, and finish every tour upstairs.
Marketing starts before the dust settles, because tenant searches start a year or more ahead of a lease ending. This runs on the four items we'd buy, from January 2027 to the last floor signed in October 2028.
6Most brokerage timelines list marketing as a block. This one ties each marketing move to the construction milestone that makes it true, so the property manager and the asset manager are reading the same page.
Leads the assignment and every tenant negotiation. Has sat on the tenant's side for eleven years, which is why this proposal is written from there.
Runs the canvass. Calls all 41 tenants and every broker in Port Averill who reps them, and brings you what they said on Monday.
Draws test fits the night after a tour. Twenty-four hours from first visit to a seat count on the tenant's desk.
Runs marketing and tour days. Builds the flyer, the broker breakfasts and the hard-hat walks, and keeps the fund on budget.
These run on the four items we'd buy until you change the list above.
7The lender's rep and the property manager rarely get read a leasing proposal at all, and they're the two who can stall it. Each signer has one question, one tool and one answer, so this page can be forwarded without a meeting attached.
Your money comes back through value. Added income divided by the cap rate a buyer would pay, less what you spent. Move the cap rate, because that's the number nobody controls.
Every month the curve slips costs you the income on the space that should've been signed. Drag the slip and read the bill. This is the number we report against every Monday.
Today's loan is $62M at 6.25 percent, interest only, and income covers it 1.02 times. Add future funding and see when coverage clears your 1.25 test, and what equity still has to write.
They stay, and they pay. Choose which jobs run on nights and weekends. Quiet costs money, and it comes out of the 6 percent allowance already inside the budget.
No retainer. The commission follows signed feet, so slide the leases and read what you'd owe. Base terms stay the same whichever lines you keep, and every line below the first can go.
8Brokers and landlords both know the 2 percent number, so hiding it would be silly. What's new is showing the fee moving with signed feet, which turns "trust us" into a slider. The lines drop on their own so procurement-minded owners can cut without reopening the deal.
Renews for 12 months if we've signed half the available feet. If we haven't, you walk with no tail beyond the protected list.
Commission on a lease pays 50 percent at full execution and 50 percent when the tenant starts paying rent. A lease that falls through before rent start pays only the first half.
Paid by you on the same schedule, outside our fee, at 4 percent of aggregate rent. It's in the leasing cost on Carla's chapter.
We bring terms. Wystan signs. We don't quote concessions over $70 a foot in tenant improvements or 10 months free without asking first.
If the assignment ends, tenants we've toured stay on a named list for 180 days. The list is delivered on the last day and it's the only tail.
9Stating the open questions costs nothing and buys everything. These four are the ones Wystan's team would have raised on the second call, so they're on the page before that call has to happen.
The canvass starts the first Monday after the last signature, and you get the first broker call notes that Friday.