The long-term lease backfills soaks up a portion of the space in the building being vacated by Washington Mutual. The bank is vacating some 1.2 million sf of lease space in Downtown in the coming months as it moves into its new Downtown headquarters.

About half of the space WaMu will be vacating is owned by EOP. A source at EOP tells GlobeSt.com that including the Adaptis lease, EOP has signed up tenants for about 39% (233,000 sf) of the estimated 600,000 sf of EOP space WaMu will be vacating later this year. EOP senior vice president Patrick Callahan could not be reached Thursday for comment.

"Driven by one of the nation's strongest job growth rates and a 3.7 percent increase in office employment in 2005, the Seattle CBD office market is on the road to recovery," says Callahan in a prepared statement. "The demand we're seeing is broad based and with no new construction on the horizon in the CBD, we anticipate some rent growth and continued positive net absorption this year. Our occupancy rate in the CBD is 92 percent and we are pleased with the rate of space backfill, as Washington Mutual moves into its new global headquarters in the next few months."

Adaptis CEO Jim Anderson says the company will relocate from Metropolitan Park West, where it occupied three non-contiguous floors, and other office properties it has had to lease to accommodate growth. It will relocate to Wells Fargo Center in September, occupying the entire 17th floor and a portion of the 16th floor.

Parker Ferguson, a principal of local corporate real estate firm Flinn Ferguson, represented Adaptis. Leasing Director Shawn Jackson represented EOP. The negotiated lease rate was not released by the parties involved. EOP is advertising about 21% of the space in the building as available for lease. The asking rate is $23.50- to $28.00 per sf per year on a gross basis.