Avison Young began managing this property when the original ownership group defaulted on their mortgage obligations. As property managers, we were appointed by the mortgagee in possession (a bank) to take control of the property, collect the rents, document the leases in place, hire the maintenance staff, tender important maintenance contracts and get the property ready for sale within several years. We accomplished all of this and more over a three year span. In addition, our brokerage colleagues handled several significant new lease transactions and a number of lease renewals. The resulting increased cash flow favorably impacted the value of the property which we sold for our client at a much higher value than what the property had been valued at when Avison Young had begun the assignment.
At this property, Avison Young's asset services group not only manages the entire property, we also provide facility management services for our client, an insurance company that occupies approximately 50% of this 400,000 s.f. office building. In addition, we have been involved in extensive capital project management and tenant build-out assignments over the years. We work closely with our brokerage firm, which leases all of the available vacant space.
We have been managing this property for over a decade for a large US insurance company. During the real estate downturn during the early 1990's, we were able to effectively work with our client to aggressively lease the property and generate significant additional cash flow through our brokerage arm. Many of these tenants have subsequently renewed at higher rental rates. Recently, we project managed a major HVAC upgrade to meet new regulatory energy efficiency requirements.
