Union Square Office Space for Lease: How a Full-Floor Deal Gets Done

What Nomad does on a full-floor lease, from brief to signature

• Search. We take the requirement to the buildings that can hold it, around the square and in Flatiron and NoMad, including subleases and floors not yet advertised.
• Tours. Finalists are seen in one or two sessions, and each gets a test fit so the floor plate is judged at 75 desks, not by eye.
• Proposals. We ask each landlord for terms in writing and put them on a single basis.
• Negotiation. We carry the business terms through the letter of intent, then hold the landlord to them while your attorney reviews the lease.

Through all four stages, on your search, we work for you, and in most transactions the landlord pays the broker fee.

Comparing full-floor proposals beyond the asking rent

Suppose two 13,000 square foot floors both ask $70. One landlord offers ten free months on a ten-year lease and the other offers four. Those six months are worth about $455,000, and the two rents are identical. That is why a proposal is read on these lines:

• Free rent. About a month for each year of the term is customary.
• The improvement allowance. It is largest on long terms and best argued from a contractor's price.
• Escalations. A fixed 2.5 to 3 percent a year is the usual structure; check what it compounds to by the final year.
• Security. How many months are held, as cash or a letter of credit, and whether the amount reduces over time.

Add them up across the whole term and divide by the square footage, and each floor has an effective rent that can be compared.

What a 75-person company should prepare first

• Headcount today and in 18 months, with the share of people who need a private office.
• The date the current lease ends, or the date you want to move.
• A budget stated as a monthly figure.
• Recent financials. For a floor this size the landlord weighs the tenant's credit, and the deposit and guarantee move with it.
• One person with authority to approve terms, because floors near the square do not wait.

At the square, landlords defend the face rent

Owners around Union Square hold the printed number harder than anywhere else along this corridor. What they trade is term length, the shape of the escalations, the condition the floor is delivered in and timing. We keep a comparable Flatiron floor in the negotiation the whole way, a few blocks north with most of the same trains, so that each concession is measured against a real alternative. How to negotiate an office lease explains what moves and in what order.

After signing: the buildout of a 75-person floor, by the same firm

A full floor for 75 is seldom taken as it stands. Nomad's construction management group prices the work during the lease negotiation, so the allowance request rests on a real number, and then runs the job. Allow 10 to 16 weeks for a custom buildout once the lease is signed.

The live block below shows floors that fit about 75 people, taken from across our book, since a search at this size always includes the districts around the square.