Dan Gilbert’s Quicken Loans to Move Cleveland Base

By Ioana Neamt

Dan Gilbert

Cleveland—Quicken Loans is expanding its Cleveland footprint by signing a long-term lease for 81,000 square feet within Cleveland’s historic Higbee Building. The company will nearly double its downtown presence by relocating more than 400 full-time employees to the building’s fourth and fifth floors by the end of the month.

The brainchild of Detroit-based businessman Dan Gilbert, Quicken Loans was founded back in 1985 and has grown to be the nation’s largest FHA lender and the second largest retail mortgage lender overall. The Quicken Loans Cleveland web center opened in 2006 and has since grown to employ more than 400 people within the M.K. Ferguson building. The company, headquartered in downtown Detroit, was ranked fifth on Fortune Magazine’s ‘100 Best Companies to Work For’ in 2016.

“Over the past 10 years, we have built a team of hard-working Clevelanders who are passionate about two things – delivering our clients the best mortgage experience possible and continuing the momentum taking place in downtown Cleveland,” Jeff Perry, vice president & site leader for Quicken Loans’ Cleveland office, said in prepared remarks. “Our move to the Higbee Building will be big boosts to both of these objectives, allowing more room for our team to grow while contributing to the transformation of downtown Cleveland.”

The 85-year-old building housed within the Tower City Center mixed-use development is currently undergoing a $7 million renovation with the help of local contractors. The 11-story asset originally opened as Higbee’s Department Store in 1931 and was a popular shopping destination throughout the 1980s. The building was completely remodeled in 2011 and reopened as the Horseshoe Casino Cleveland. Last month, Rock Gaming LLC—another Dan Gilbert venture—took over management of the property and renamed it JACK Cleveland Casino. The historic property was added to the National Register of Historic Places back in 1976.

Image courtesy of the JACK Cleveland Casino Facebook page