Developer Revving Up Plans for Another Three Buildings

The second wave of commercial construction will add 197,000 sf of retail and office space in a trio of four-story buildings. Like those before them, all will have street-level retail space to create a Main Street vintage setting with new bricks and mortar. If ground breaks as planned, the buildings will deliver in early 2006.

Renowned architect, David Schwarz of Washington, DC, designed the neo-traditional development. At its announcement in August 2000, Frisco Square's estimated build-out cost was $170 million in a 12-year delivery plan.

In the coming weeks, construction will wrap up on last of three commercial buildings. The 54,415-sf building at 6136 Frisco Square Blvd. has 11,894 sf of retail and 42,521 sf of office space. Save for a couple small suites, the office space is gone.

"All the leasing has been done before the building officially delivers," Jim Yoder, principal with Dallas-based Trammell Crow Co., tells GlobeSt.com. "That's rare for Dallas. It's a very good success ... with very strong rental rates." The speedy office leasing is being done at rates of $23 per sf to $24 per sf plus electric and "fairly low" TI packages, says Yoder, who's leasing partners include Jeff Eckert, vice president, and Ashley Allen, associate.

Similar success is playing out in the first two deliveries: an 87,466-sf building at 8849 Coleman Blvd. with 21,749 sf of retail and 57 apartments and an 87,160-sf structure at 8850 Coleman Blvd. with 21,753 sf of retail and another 57 apartments.

Dallas-based Lincoln Property Co. has the 114 apartments at 77% occupancy and 94% leased. Apartments, averaging 970 sf, lease for 97 cents per sf. Meanwhile, more than half of the 38 custom townhomes have been sold at prices from $250,000 to $500,000 for 2,900-sf to 4,300-sf floor plans.

On the retail side, 7,893 sf of 55,396 sf have been filled by in-house leasing vice president Sherry A. Koetting. Retail rents average $23 per sf triple net. Five Star Development's marketing manager Debby Hanson says office and retail tenants, on the average, are signing five-year leases.

Retailers in place are Best Thai and Subway; soon to open are Frisco Square Cleaners and Poppi's Pizza & Pasta. On the office side, incoming tenants include a full floor leased to an executive suites operator, the City of Frisco, engineering firm Hunter Associates and a doctor.

At full build-out, Frisco Square will have 308 townhomes, 1,600 apartments, 1.9 million sf of office space, 75,000 sf of retail and restaurant pad sites, 550,000 sf of retail space and 800,000 sf of municipal facilities. The city hall and library have broken ground; a seniors center is done. Soon, work begins on a museum. The town center development neighbors the $65-million Frisco Soccer and Entertainment Complex, set to open in the spring as the Dallas Burn's home turf. Hanson predicts retail leasing momentum will pick up significantly after the stadium opens.

In a press release, Cole McDowell, founder and president of the Flower Mound-based Five Star Development, says he's counting on density, the tenant mix and special event space to build a community so "you get to know your neighbors. I believe in creating communities."