Luce, Forward Signs 10-Year Lease

SAN DIEGO-Luce, Forward, Hamilton & Scripps has agreed on a long-term lease agreement that will keep it in the space it already occupies at One America Plaza, one of Downtown’s trophy properties. The firm signed on for an additional 10 years on a lease that had three years remaining on it. Dollar amounts of the lease were not made public, but the lease calls for Luce, Forward to take just over 101,000 sf, which is a 20% reduction in space over what the firm has previously occupied. The firm previously held 125,000 sf of the class A office space that had been expanded over the past 10 years.Though the lease is a downsize in space, it’s not a reduction in personnel, according to a broker who worked on the deal. “The firm’s doing very well,” says John Niemi, Western region head and executive vice president for Equis Corp.”They were like about 80% of large firms that built out space in the late 80s and early 90s,” Niemi tells Globest.com. They expanded and expanded, often without good use of efficient space. “Law libraries and storage space doesn’t need to be as big anymore.”"Luce, Forward wanted to digitize its libraries,” says Marc Schwartz, Equis vice president and workplace integration consultant. “By providing landlord funding, the transaction enabled the firm to digitize immediately and vacate an entire floor in the process. Getting the entire process on the fast track was the key to achieving all the benefits of the restructured lease for this client.”Equis’ team which arranged the renewal included Niemi, Jim Hughes, San Diego office head and senior vice president, and John Mitchell, vice president. Landlord Sentre Partners was self-represented.Chicago-based Equis Corp. is a full-service real estate firm that focuses exclusively on the business space user. Among its clients are Bayer Corp., Charter Communications, DaimlerChrysler, Delphi Automotive and Qwest Communications.