CUSHMAN & WAKEFIELD ARRANGES $285 MILLION SALE OF JERSEY CITY’S 10 EXCHANGE PLACE
Manulife Real Estate Enters NYC Metro Real Estate Market with Latest Acquisition
JERSEY CITY, N.J. – December 20, 2011 – (RealEstateRama) — Cushman & Wakefield’s Metropolitan Area Capital Markets Group (CMG) has orchestrated the sale of 10 Exchange Place. The 748,005-square-foot building is a 30-story trophy office tower and a skyline landmark on Jersey City’s Hudson River waterfront.
The Cushman & Wakefield team of Andrew J. Merin, David W. Bernhaut, Gary Gabriel, Brian J. Whitmer and Kyle B. Schmidt represented the seller, a client of INVESCO, in the transaction. The buyer was Manulife Real Estate, the global real estate arm of Canada-based Manulife Financial Corporation, one of the largest life insurance companies in the world and parent company of John Hancock Financial. This acquisition represents Manulife’s entry into the New York City Metropolitan real estate market.
Completed in 1988, 10 Exchange Place was the recent recipient of BOMA’s 2011 TOBY (The Outstanding Building of the Year) award for buildings over 500,000 square feet. LEED-Gold and Energy Star certified, the iconic tower offers unobstructed views of lower Manhattan from every floor. The 100-percent leased building has a tenant roster that includes renowned international companies such as ACE Insurance, Daikin McQuay, Kuehne + Nagel, Rabobank, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs and Amazon.com. 10 Exchange Place sits atop the most comprehensive mass-transit infrastructure in the region, offering direct access to PATH rail to New York City, as well as light rail, bus and ferry service.
“Jersey City, with its location and connectivity to lower Manhattan, functions as New York City’s ‘sixth borough’ in terms of value and velocity in the office market,” said Merin. “We continue to see an appetite by investors for large, well-located premier assets in this submarket. With its accessibility, Jersey City provides an affordable alternative to Manhattan for Wall Street-related firms.
“Proximity to lower Manhattan clearly enhances the value of office properties along the waterfront,” Merin added. “In a year of mixed investment activity, there has been $1 billion of sales in four transactions in Jersey City alone, and our firm has been directly involved in three of those deals. A recent upswing in activity bodes well for the market.”
The sale of 10 Exchange Place continues a long line of major transactions completed by Cushman & Wakefield’s Metropolitan Area Capital Markets Group. The CMG specializes in investment sales of office, industrial, multifamily and retail properties in New Jersey, New York, Connecticut’s Fairfield County, and Pennsylvania. The team has exceeded $1 billion of transactions in 2011 and more than $18 billion since 1995.
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