Outsourcing Deal of the Year: 65-Mil SF, 38-State Portfolio

No one's putting a value on the contract or talking about terms. Suffice it to say, it's "long term," Tony Long, Trammell Crow's managing director in Dallas, tells GlobeSt.com. It's Trammell Crow's largest outsourcing pact in the corporate division's 11-year history and ranks in the Top 5 for Jones Lang LaSalle.

Trammell Crow gets 35 million sf in 23 states, Texas and east, plus another five million sf of headquarters facilities in Charlotte, NC. Jones Lang LaSalle is overseeing 30 million sf in the Western United States and Illinois, as well as New York City, Buffalo, NY and El Paso, TX. Jones Lang LaSalle also manages about two million sf of the bank's properties in Europe, Asia and Latin America. "We already had the rest of the world so we were real keen to get at least 50% of the United States," Peter Barge, Jones Lang LaSalle's chairman of corporate solutions, tells GlobeSt.com.

With the shared contract comes a pledge between the two corporate real estate giants to share ideas and strategies in an unprecedented move to shore up negotiations. The contract was inked Sept. 1, but was delayed in its announcement as both got their new offices, new hires and their veterans up and running on the account.

Bruce Ficke of Jones Lang LaSalle and Curt Grantham of Trammell Crow negotiated the deal and were awarded managing director titles to steer the ship for their respective companies. Grantham has relocated from Dallas to Charlotte, which will serve as Trammell Crow's homeport for the 580 professionals, of which 350 are new hires, to service the account from multiple locations. Forty professionals are assigned to Charlotte. Trammell Crow also has set up regional offices for the account in Tampa, Dallas and Atlanta. Ficke's 510-member team, which also boasts 350 new employees, will use Los Angeles, San Francisco and New York City as account hubs, with regional offices being placed in Phoenix and Chicago. The teaming also brings offices to Baltimore, Houston, Jacksonville, Miami and St. Louis. The duo says it's all been orchestrated in 90 to 120 days.

Prior to the contract, Bank of America outsourced with five corporate real estate firms, all of which reportedly were under consideration for the contract. The other three were CB Richard Ellis of Los Angeles, Lincoln Property Co. of Dallas and Charles E. Smith of Arlington, VA, according to Long. Trammell Crow's relationship with the bank dates back to 1993 and Jones Lang LaSalle, 1991.

A full gamut of services will be provided and "there will be a unique collaboration of ideas and practices between the two companies," Long assures. Barge says the willingness to play on the same team gave the competitive edge that was needed to secure the contract and is sure to bring the utmost benefit to the client. "Talk to the bank and they'll tell you that they've never seen a level of cooperation like this before," he says.

Grantham says the outsourcing consolidation is sure to shave costs for Bank of America, which now has a team in place to handle a large-scale disposition of surplus properties vacant since the NationsBank takeover. Savings will be realized in the leveraging of "collective scale, greater purchasing power, new technology," Grantham adds. All eyes will be on streamlining, from processes to costs, and new real estate services will be forthcoming. "The models we're creating–both with the bank and with each other–represent innovative approaches in our industry," says Ficke, who's bsed in Atlanta.