The property is the newest building in Liberty's 650-acre, master-planned Great Valley Corporate Center, which is the locally based REIT's largest suburban project. There's room for one more, and Tom Sklow, Liberty's VP of leasing and development, tells GlobeSt.com, it will be "the crowning achievement of Bill Rouse's vision for the center," referring to the company's late CEO, who, after his death, was succeeded by Bill Hankowsky.
Located at Three Quarry Ridge at the entryway to the center, Sklow says it will be a six-story 200,000-sf office building, constructed to meet LEED green building certification standards. "At six stories, overlooking a lake, it will be the center's flagship property," he says. "We are preleasing now, and, as soon as we get a lead tenant of about 50,000 sf, we'll break ground." He says the asking rent is between $30 per sf and $32 per sf, plus electric.
"If we had space left in Two W. Liberty Blvd.," he adds, "the rate in that building would be $28 per sf, plus electric," which makes it the most expensive existing building in the center. The four new tenants leased an aggregate of 16,653 sf.
The largest of the four is Dental EZ with 7,112 sf, which it will occupy in early 2008. The others are Grange Mutual Casualty Co. with 3,593 sf, Kenderian Zilinski Associates with 3,469 sf, and Elster American Meter with 2,479 sf. Liberty fit out the space for each new tenant.
The full lease up "is reflective of the organic growth that the Route 202 corridor is experiencing," Sklow says. "The biotech and pharmaceutical industries are a strong economic engine nationally and here in Chester County," he notes, "and Chester County is the fastest growing county in the commonwealth. We are very bullish on the 202 corridor."
Small wonder. Completion of lease-up in the newest building combines with ten new lease agreements, 10 renewals and seven expansions in buildings within the five-million-sf center, which take its overall occupancy above 98%. Among the largest of the new tenants are 84,000 sf for Micron Technologies at 333 Phoenixville Pike and 30,022 sf for Veltek Associates Inc. at 175 Great Valley Pkwy.
Siemens added a total of 29,033 sf in two buildings while also renewing its lease for 31,776 sf. Cephalon Inc. renewed its current total of 148,714 sf and added another 11,840 sf. Sanofi-aventis renewed leases for a total of 40,642 sf in two buildings and took an additional 11,600 sf in a third.
Great Valley Corporate Center contains 80 office and R&D buildings. Area amenities include several hotels, a shopping center, day care facilities including one for adults, a health club and the local campuses of Penn State University, Drexel University's LeBow School of Business and Temple University's Fox School of Business.
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