Source: Globe Street
While Hines’ Senior Managing Director John Heagy was able to close a massive deal with Microsoft at the 523,000 square-foot Atlantic Yards office development in West Midtown Atlanta in May, he admits COVID has upended the office leasing process.
“There is no question that the environment for traditional marketing has been completely rocked,” Heagy says. “While we were working with Microsoft [before the pandemic], we were able to show space, have meetings with them directly and meet them at the site on a regular basis. We’re just not able to do that right now.”
While brokers are now able to meet with clients again, if both parties are willing, the process is still cumbersome. Everyone is wearing masks, staying socially distant and arriving in different cars.
“You’ll hear that [that the process is cumbersome] from brokers that you talk with on the ownership side, but we have worked pretty hard to make it as easy as possible for brokers to do tours with us,” Heagy says.
Like many firms, Hines has adopted virtual leasing to supplement more limited in-person interactions. “We’ve gotten really good at doing virtual tours,” Heagy says. “Whether we’re taking up a camera and introducing ourselves over the camera and then walking around the building and doing the tours via Zoom or other means, we’ve gotten very good at doing that end of the presentation.”
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