Nemer Hires Grubb to Lease Troy Place

TROY, MI-Nemer Proeprty Group Inc., one of the partners in the joint venture that owns the fived-building Troy Place office campus, has brought on Grubb & Ellis Co. to help with leasing. The five-building, 750,000-square-foot complex is 35% vacant.

While the property is at W. Big Beaver Road and Coolidge Highway, at what had formerly been State and Main for office leasing in the Detroit area, corporate downsizing has hit the area hard. The Troy submarket, much like the rest of the metropolitan area, is about 30% vacant.

Troy Place has as a main tenant the military contractor BAE, which leases 90,000 square feet, but also has lost more than 65,000 square feet after Sears pulled out of the building. The complex is across the street from the former Kmart world headquarters, which moved to Hoffman Estates, IL after Sears acquired the company. “We lost several tenants after Kmart’s offices closed, they were suppliers,” says Larry Nemer. The Kmart site is now owned by the Forbes Co., which also owns the nearby Somerset Collection mall and is part owner in the Troy Place venture.

Daniel Canvasser with Grubb & Ellis tells GlobeSt.com that the complex is still one of the top office sites in the Detroit area. “About 95% of the tenants who have left were moved because of consolidation, or they went out of business in Michigan. We’re not losing them to other buildings,” he says.

Troy also boasts most of the metropolitan area’s newest office buildings, but because of the downturn now can offer pretty cheap rent, Canvasser says. The asking rate in the complex runs from $16.95 to $18.50, gross. Also, the complex has undergone millions of dollars in renovations to keep a current look for tenants.

Regardless, both men said they know they have their work cut out for them, as movement in the suburban office market is mostly tenants going from one site to another. “And then you’ve got the buildings that go into foreclosure and get snatched up cheap, the buyers can charge lower rent and put more downward pressure on the market,” Nemer tells GlobeSt.com. “Bottom line, we need some jobs for the area, and we need to see absorption and growth in the corporate settings.”