WASHINGTON, DC–After quietly launching a rental service that was limited to a few clients nine months ago, Urban Pace is about to open the service's doors to the broader market. The company first took on the lease-up of The Aspen — a 133-unit building in Mt. Vernon Triangle neighborhood developed by Ellisdale Construction. There are now 120 units rented and Urban Pace is moving forward with three more rental projects that it has in its pipeline, co-President Matt Dewey tells GlobeSt.com.
These are 30 units on U Street, 60 units in the 14th Street Corridor and 40 units in Brookland, he says.
The company is using a CRM system that it has been customizing and implementing for the past year to manage both its leasing and its sales activities.
“The sales and rental processes are similar in many ways, in terms of communication with the tenants or buyers,” Dewey says. Tweaks were necessary to adjust for timing and for the behavior of people in this industry as opposed to a prospect in, say, the B2B industrial space.
“For a condo sale you could be working with a buyer for 30 days,” he says. “For a lease, a week is a long time. Everything had to be adjusted on the platform” to accommodate these time lines and related engagement.
The Growth Story
Urban Pace is moving into leasing services as part of its overall growth plan. It has been pushing into other markets beyond its home base of the Washington DC area and has made inroads into China as well. Within a year, the company expects to have a presence in three or four market including its DC footprint and its emerging profile in Philadelphia.
Read Urban Pace's Expansion Plans Includes Doubling Down On Foreign Buyers
The decision to move into leasing was in part driven by demand from developer clients, according to Dewey. In some cases builders will look at both rental and net sales before they start a project and they have turned to Urban Pace for advice on both scenarios, Dewey says.
WASHINGTON, DC–After quietly launching a rental service that was limited to a few clients nine months ago, Urban Pace is about to open the service's doors to the broader market. The company first took on the lease-up of The Aspen — a 133-unit building in Mt. Vernon Triangle neighborhood developed by Ellisdale Construction. There are now 120 units rented and Urban Pace is moving forward with three more rental projects that it has in its pipeline, co-President Matt Dewey tells GlobeSt.com.
These are 30 units on U Street, 60 units in the 14th Street Corridor and 40 units in Brookland, he says.
The company is using a CRM system that it has been customizing and implementing for the past year to manage both its leasing and its sales activities.
“The sales and rental processes are similar in many ways, in terms of communication with the tenants or buyers,” Dewey says. Tweaks were necessary to adjust for timing and for the behavior of people in this industry as opposed to a prospect in, say, the B2B industrial space.
“For a condo sale you could be working with a buyer for 30 days,” he says. “For a lease, a week is a long time. Everything had to be adjusted on the platform” to accommodate these time lines and related engagement.
The Growth Story
Urban Pace is moving into leasing services as part of its overall growth plan. It has been pushing into other markets beyond its home base of the Washington DC area and has made inroads into China as well. Within a year, the company expects to have a presence in three or four market including its DC footprint and its emerging profile in Philadelphia.
Read Urban Pace's Expansion Plans Includes Doubling Down On Foreign Buyers
The decision to move into leasing was in part driven by demand from developer clients, according to Dewey. In some cases builders will look at both rental and net sales before they start a project and they have turned to Urban Pace for advice on both scenarios, Dewey says.
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Erika Morphy
Erika Morphy has been writing about commercial real estate at GlobeSt.com for more than ten years, covering the capital markets, the Mid-Atlantic region and national topics. She's a nerd so favorite examples of the former include accounting standards, Basel III and what Congress is brewing.
