From left: Ric Clark, Dennis Friedrich and Tom Farley

Brookfield Office Properties has shuffled desks in its executive suite. Bloomberg News reported that the owners of World Financial Center and the developer of Manhattan West has promoted CEO Ric Clark to chairman and replaced him with co-President Dennis Friedrich. [more]

From left: Jerry Larkin, who heads up leasing for Brookfield Office Properties in New York, and Bruce Mosler of Cushman & Wakefield.

From the February issue: If Brookfield Office Properties’ newly aggressive stance in Manhattan isn’t keeping Related Companies’ Stephen Ross and Silverstein Properties’ Larry Silverstein awake at night, it probably should be.

Publicly traded Brookfield Office Properties, led by CEO Ric Clark, is looking to lease up as much as 10 million square feet of office space over the next few years in Manhattan — which may be the most space any private company has ever put on the market at one time. [more]

Brookfield Office Properties CEO Ric Clark and 4 World Financial CenterBrookfield Office Properties has struck a deal with Bank of America to take its 49 percent stake in 4 World Financial Center and will own the entire property, the Wall Street Journal reported. Bank of America simultaneously renewed its lease for 750,000 square feet in the tower.

The largest landlord in the neighborhood, Brookfield has committed to Lower Manhattan with this deal and its recent promise to spend $250 million to upgrade the retail at the World Financial Center. However, with layoffs looming at financial firms and millions of vacant square feet being delivered in the World Trade Center, Brookfield has reason to be concerned. … [more]

Brookfield Office Properties, owners of about 18 million square feet of office space in the New York area, could complete its massive development site between Ninth and Dyer avenues and 31st and 33rd streets, dubbed “Manhattan West,” by 2017, CEO Ric Clark told the New York Times in a Q & A. The plan calls for four buildings, two of which are 2 million square feet each and span the north and south sides of the project, with another 1 million-square-foot building occupying the southwest corner. The fourth, a smaller building whose square footage is still undetermined, will be used for retail or office space. Construction is slated to begin on the project in January, and the first of the two biggest buildings could be ready for occupancy by late 2015, Clark said…. [more]

The CEO at commercial landlord Brookfield Office Properties said the firm could lease as much as 50 percent more office space this year compared with its best year ever.

On top of approximately 3 million square feet leased in the first quarter, “we could add another eight to nine million square feet of leasing this year, giving us something like 11 to 12 million square feet. That’s 40 to 50 percent better than our best year ever,” company CEO Ric Clark said. The firm has an interest in 109 office properties globally with 78 million square feet of space.

Clark was speaking today at the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts conference in Midtown.

Although the office leasing market is improving in Manhattan following the downturn, Clark did not expect new leases signed at its World Financial Center Downtown to start at the same level as those now paid by financial services giant Merrill Lynch. … [more]