Moody National Signs WSP to Houston Office Development

An engineering and design firm’s office consolidation is a leasing win for a landlord near Memorial City.

WSP leased 21,600 square feet in the Village Towers office complex at 9655 Katy Freeway, the Houston Business Journal reported.

The two-building, six-story complex spans 240,000 square feet and is owned by local firm Moody National Companies, which developed it in 2021.

WSP, a subsidiary of Canada-based WSP Global, has about 340 employees in Houston, which it will consolidate into the Village Towers lease. Its previous leases spanned 13,400 in the Esperson Building, at 808 Travis Street, and 26,100 at 16200 Park Row Boulevard.

Houston-based Interra Capital Group bought the historic Esperson Building out of foreclosure earlier this year; previous owner Cameron Management still manages the property. The identity of the Park Row building’s owner is obscured by an LLC, but the two-building lowrise office building was developed in 2019, according to appraisal district records.

The Village Towers has an on-site gym, restaurants and the Goodman events center. Houston’s office market is struggling, but amenity-filled office buildings in prime locations are faring better than older products nationwide, as companies seek to attract workers back to the office.

The vacancy rate is sitting at about 26 percent in Greater Houston, but buildings constructed in the 1970s and ’80s account for the vast majority of that vacancy.

WSP has provided engineering design services for the Katy Freeway, the Galveston National Laboratory, Willis Tower and the city of Houston water supply. It is at work on the biosciences research facility under construction at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center.

—Rachel Stone