Background

 

McGettigan Partners, Inc. (now Maritz Travel Co.) was a client of REIS since the 1980's when we were charged with establishing a cohesive, efficient and high image space for a company with six separate leased spaces within one building. The result of an extensive search and planning process was to relocate McGettigan into The Wanamaker Building, the historic home of the former department store. McGettigan was to become one of the first office tenants in the converted upper floors of The Wanamaker Building. Due to the discovery during lease negotiations of uneven cinder filled wood floors and an ornate historic ceiling, REIS negotiated the landlord and tenant work letter responsibilities so as to eliminate the risk of cost overruns from McGettigan’s tenant improvements.

 

Lease Restructuring

 

During the recession of the 1990's, McGettigan’s business declined substantially and McGettigan needed to reduce its space to contain costs. We worked with them to downsize their offices and ultimately consulted with them on the exercise of an early termination option. The exercise of this right followed a search for smaller office space allowing substantial real estate expenditure reductions despite expensive relocation costs for the computers, phone system and voice/data cabling. Prior to actually selecting a new building, however, McGettigan secured a tremendous amount of new business within a few weeks and consequently, their space requirements changed once again.

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In mid 1997 we restructured McGettigan’s Wanamaker Building lease, locking in very favorable rates for a long term.

 

National Site Selection Process

 

Our role for McGettigan continues to expand with each new venture in their business plan. We partnered with McGettigan for all of their real estate needs, including opening branch offices in Chicago, San Francisco, Indianapolis and New York City. In addition, we conducted a regional site selection process for a new McGettigan venture that includes labor and transportation analyses.

 

Tenant Asset Management

 

Through our review process, we became aware that McGettigan’s landlord made a substantial error in recalculating the base year amount. Through negotiations with the landlord, we succeeded in correcting the overcharge.