WASHINGTON, DC—Brookfield Property Partners has secured its first prelease for 2001 M St., NW, a 285,000-square foot office building it is redeveloping in the city's CBD. The law firm Bracewell & Giuliani LLP is taking 50,000 square feet. Meanwhile, there are other law firms and tenants expressing strong interest in the space, David Bevirt, senior vice president of Leasing in Brookfield's Office Division tells GlobeSt.com.

"We are in discussions with other firms as well," he says. No letters of intent have been signed.

Asking rents for the trophy redevelopment, which is expected to deliver in Spring of 2016, range from the upper $40s per square foot to mid $50s, triple net. The retail component of the property is also in the $50 per square foot asking range, triple net.

Brookfield secured construction financing for the project. Bevirt declined to say what the development costs have been.

The company announced at the beginning of last year that it would redevelop the building, which was largely vacant. It is expanding the 229,000-square foot building to 285,000 square feet, adding a tenth floor.

The company planned the timing of the delivery very carefully, Bevirt says. "We looked at what the competition was bringing to market and where the demand would be at this point in the cycle. We knew there would be a window in which there was a limited amount of new development in the CBD. We also knew that there would be more than the usual number of large leases expiring around the 2016, 2017 time frame," he explains. "For all those reasons, we decided it was worthwhile to move forward on a spec basis."

Bevirt estimates that by the time the building delivers it will be 50% pre leased.

Bracewell & Giuliani was represented by Tim Relyea, Malcolm Marshall and Sherry Cushman, of Cushman & Wakefield. Brookfield was represented by David Bevirt, Cy Kouhestani, and Melanie Stehmer-Townsend.