Avison Young Continues Expansion with Opening of Dallas Office

July 11, 2011
By Barbra Murray, Contributing Editor

Not content to settle for its status as Canada’s largest independently owned commercial real estate services company, Avison Young is moving full steam ahead with its U.S. expansion plan, and the debut of a new office in Dallas constitutes the firm’s latest step in its growth strategy.

Avison Young has grabbed longtime industry player Brock Wilson from real estate services firm Grubb & Ellis Co. to serve as principal with the responsibility of spearheading the development of a prominent Avison Young footprint in the area. “We have always considered Dallas as one of the key commercial markets in the U.S., and with the hiring of Brock, we are able to begin building our business in Dallas to complement our rapidly growing Houston-based business,” Mark E. Rose, chair and CEO of Avison Young, said.

Dallas and Houston are certainly in recovery mode; office and industrial numbers tell the story. In Dallas, the vacancy rate in the office and industrial markets dropped 90 and 30 basis points, respectively, in the first quarter, according to a report by Grubb & Ellis, which also just lost two of its top guns, Scott Fikes and Alex Bryant, to Avison Young’s Houston office. In Houston, the office market posted approximately 421,500 square feet of positive absorption during the first quarter, and the industrial market experienced its sixth consecutive quarter of positive absorption, soaking up roughly 162,700 square feet. “Opening a new office in Dallas–one of the largest markets in the US–while growing our Houston operations is a strategic move that will allow us to provide a full-service platform in Texas and the Southwest region of the U.S.,” Rand Stephens, principal and managing director in Avison Young’s Houston office, said.

The company is not limiting its expansion endeavor to the Southwest, though, or any other region of the U.S., for that matter. Just days before announcing the opening of its new Dallas office, Avison Young revealed that it had acquired Millennium Realty Advisors L.L.C. in McLean, Va., in a move to boost its presence in the Washington, D.C. area’s coveted Northern Virginia market.

Avison Young’s growth strategy has led to its addition of 13 offices and 450 real estate professionals in Canada and the U.S. over the last two-and-a-half years.