"It's a law firm and they had a lot of alternatives. We werereally fortunate to keep them in Uptown," Kim Brooks, senior vicepresident for Transwestern Commercial Services' Dallas office,tells GlobeSt.com. "When you have a large tenant like that,everyone's calling them." And call they did as every titleholder toclass A and class AA space with available floors tried to scoop thetenant from the 3102 Oak Lawn Ave. address.

The firm's brokers Carl Ewert and Karra Guess with Dallas-basedStaubach Co. started working the market last summer. The longer itlingered, the more rumors flew. By February, the Transwestern team,which includes vice president Scott Walker, eliminated most of thecompetition and turned into the final stretch in June. "I reallyfelt like they were focused on our building for the last threemonths," Brooks says. The final stretch centered on fine-tuningcontract language, she says.

The end result is an early renewal, a 24,000-sf giveback at theend of 2006 and a cosmetic-only finish-out that isn't nearly ascostly as the rumored price tag or the $3-million estimated cost tomove and retool new law firm space. The deal takes effecttoday.