Bigger is usually better, especially in Manhattan commercial real estate, but who s the biggest of them all?
In this issue, The Real Deal presents a review of 10 top landlords whose holdings collectively add up to around 120 million square feet of space, the equivalent of a dozen World Trade Centers. The group, which includes active buyers like Jamestown, SL Green, Tishman Speyer, and The Moinian Group, purchased 13.4 million square feet of office buildings last year in the midst of a record sales market.
At the top of the list, SL Green, the publicly traded REIT, owns more square feet than any of its competitors, with 17 million square feet of office buildings in Manhattan.
The firm, once known as king of the Class B market, has upgraded its portfolio, and added 1.3 million square feet in 2004, with purchases like 750 Third Ave. and 485 Lexington Ave.
SL Green CEO and president Marc Holliday says he expects the volume of his company s buys this year “will be less by design. We ll be focusing more internally on leasing.” But with properties like the MetLife Building on the block, he expects the sales market to continue to be as strong as last year.
Tishman Speyer, which owns top-notch trophy properties including Rockefeller Center and The Chrysler Center, clocked in a close second, with 16.75 million square feet of space. Even if the Jerry Speyer-led company owned only Rockefeller Center, with its 8 million square feet of commercial space, it would have cracked the top 10 list.
Tishman added 2 million square feet of space to its portfolio in 2004, buying the Lipstick Building, the New York Times Building, Cityspire (the tallest mixed-use building in Manhattan) and 40 Broad Street.
But the biggest buyer in 2004 was The Moinian Group, which bought 3 million square feet of office space, much of it slated for residential conversion. The company owns 14 million square feet in Manhattan, and around 75 percent of its total portfolio is commercial.
The survey relied on figures submitted by companies as well as The Real Deal’s own research in adding up each firm s portfolio building by building. Totals include projects in development, but not sales in contract. The survey does not factor in partial ownership of buildings, except in the case of Jamestown, which has partial interest in a number of sizable buildings, and asked for that fact to be noted.
Go to Biggest Commercial Landlords survey