Brown & Brown Signs Lease at KBS-Owned Office in Plano

Dallas’ suburban office market clocked another win in the form of a lease near Plano’s Legacy West.

Insurance brokerage Brown & Brown inked a deal to occupy 41,000 square feet at Legacy Town Center, a three-building, 522,000-square-foot office park owned by KBS Real Estate Investment III, according to a release from KBS.

Legacy Town Center, at 6900 North Dallas Parkway, was delivered between 2001 and 2006. The property features a gym and free bike sharing program.

The office is in the Shops at Legacy, which features 84 restaurants, and it’s near Legacy West, a mixed-use development with 15 restaurants, 45 retailers and a Renaissance Hotel. Legacy Town Center provides a private shuttle to both developments.

The lease is an example of how the north Dallas suburbs are buoying the Metroplex’s office market.

At the year’s halfway point, the North Texas office market posted positive net absorption, according to JLL. Absorption was highest this quarter in suburbs along Central Expressway, like Plano and McKinney, as well as in Irving’s Las Colinas area.

Brown & Brown is just the latest company to announce a move to Plano. Earlier this year, Sally Beauty announced it is relocating from its longtime headquarters in Denton to a 140,000-square-foot spot at 7900 Windrose Avenue in Plano’s Legacy West. In addition, California-based Simpson Strong-Tie Company inked a deal for 38,000 at Granite Park 6 in Plano.

Vacancy is stuck at 27.7 percent across Dallas-Fort Worth, and that high rate is attributable to empty space in the region’s office properties built in the ’80s and ’90s.

The vacancy rate has declined for Class A properties, CBRE reported, highlighting the continued prevalence of the flight-to-quality trend that has office users seeking properties with high-end amenities to lure their remote workers back to the office.