BOMA panel award officers
By ALEX PHILIPPIDIS :: January 12, 2007

RECKSON FLASH

Reckson, SL Green plan Jan. 25 closing of $6B sale
SL Green Realty Corp. and Reckson Associates Realty Corp. announced about 5:30 p.m. today that they currently expect to close their previously announced $6 billion merger on or about Jan. 25. Green will buy Reckson, then sell off the Reckson Platinum, Reckson Tarrytown and 80-100 Grasslands Road campus in Valhalla to a joint venture of three Reckson execs led by CEO Scott Rechler and Marathon Asset Management led by Purchase developer Jon L. Halpern.

BOMA WESTCHESTER:

At luncheon talk, brokers (mostly) bullish

New awards: Goodbye TOBY, hello BOB

Group names its new officers for 2007

At luncheon talk, panelists (mostly) bullish;

Rising rents, the redevelopment of White Plains, and the trend of strong sales activity should make 2007 a bullish year for Westchester’s office market, four panelists agreed during BOMA Westchester’s annual “State of the Market” luncheon, held today at the Crowne Plaza hotel in White Plains.

“Frankly, I don’t expect any surprises,” said Robert P. Weisz, president of RPW Group Inc.
“I think we’re going to have a great year,” said Robert Caruso, the senior managing director who heads the Westchester/Fairfield operation for CB Richard Ellis Inc.

Caruso and James C. Fagan – senior managing director and head of Cushman & Wakefield’s Westchester, Fairfield County and Long Island offices – said downtown White Plains will continue to draw new tenant businesses able to afford rents that have surged several dollars per square foot over the past year.

Asking rents now go as high as $40 per square foot for the priciest buildings closest to the Metro-North Railroad station, while taking rents have been in the mid $30s psf. Fagan predicted a 25 percent jump in White Plains rents over the next two years.

C&W’s top regional office sales broker, Patrick Colwell, said he’s optimistic sales volume will rise this year as it did last. In 2006 some $474 million in office properties changed hands in Westchester. That’s better than 2005’s $406 million -- more than half of which came from a single deal, the soon-to-be acquired Reckson Associates Realty Corp.’s $255 million purchase of the EastRidge Properties portfolio.

Weisz said Westchester was two years away from seeing new construction of office buildings. With sale prices just cracking the $200 per square foot mark, he said, it’s still cheaper, he said, for owners to buy existing buildings, renovate them, re-lease them at higher rents, then sell than it is to build new.

“We’re still below replacement cost,” Weisz said. “There’s been no new building in Westchester in the last 20 years. We still have a long way to go.”

Other notes:

NEW ROCHELLE AND YONKERS: Their downtown redevelopment efforts have not advanced enough to make them significant office markets any time soon, Fagan and Caruso agreed.

NEW YORK CITY: Skyrocketing Big Apple rents will price some companies out of the market and force them to consider moving to Westchester and Fairfield counties, Caruso said.

Even with the recent 53,500-square-foot lease by Wachtell Lipton Rosen & Katz at 55 Church St. in downtown White Plains, Fagan said, don’t expect a flood of Manhattan law firms to move north: “If you are a law firm and all your clients are in New York, I don’t care how cheap the rent is Westchester. You’re not going to move there.”

AFFORDABLE HOUSING: Robert Caruso hit the nail on the head when he said Westchester’s office market would fare even better if the county and local communities ensured more below-market housing were available:

“fine for people who make a lot of money. For the back office support staff, it’s difficult

New awards: Goodbye TOBY, hello BOB;

BOMA Westchester this year will launch a new “Best of BOMA, Westchester County Signature Awards” program to replace “The Office Building of The Year.” Instead of naming winners in categories based on the size of their buildings, as TOBY did, the new award will name winners in seven qualitative categories:

* Best interior public space.

* Best exterior public space.

* Best green building.

* Best amenities.

* Best technically-advanced building -- The technology could include energy efficiency, security, and/or preventive maintenance.

* Comeback Building of the Year – The property showing the most positive “change in image, leasing activity or possibly major capital improvements,” according to BOMA.

* Deal of the Year – All brokers involved in the winning transaction share in the award. The winner “can be considered to have the greatest beneficial impact for Westchester County.

“Things to consider might be job retention or amount of positive press generated for Westchester County,” BOMA Westchester adds.

We could have some fun with this. What buildings do you think merit awards from BOMA Westchester? E-mail me with some ideas at alex@westfairinc.com. If I get any suggestions, I’ll post ‘em here on D&D. And if enough readers ask, I’ll share with y’all my own winners in these categories.

Group names its new officers for 2007

BOMA Westchester has sworn in its officers for 2007:

President: Tammi Cuomo, a property manager with soon-to-be-sold Reckson Associates Realty Corp., was elected to a second term.

Vice president: Kim Zaccagnino of W&M Properties.

Secretary/treasurer: Maryann Martini of Martini Associates.

Directors: Dean Bender of Thompson & Bender, the Briarcliff Manor PR agency that represents BOMA Westchester; David Block of CB Richard Ellis; Sean Brown of Kastle Systems; Anthony Ivey of Mack-Cali Realty Corp.; George Palmiero of Diamond Properties; Mario Tarantino of the brokerage Grubb & Ellis.

Allied Representative: Charles Brown, Jr. of C.W. Brown, Inc.

Swearing-in of officers took place Dec. 7 at BOMA Westchester’s Annual Holiday Party and Inauguration of Officers, held at the Hampshire Country Club in Mamaroneck.