Miami Herald Signs 158 KSF Lease to Relocate HQ

January 30, 2012
By Barbra Murray, Contributing Editor

Image courtesy Wikipedia user Averette

Eight months after The Miami Herald Co.’s Miami digs were sold in a short-term, quasi sale-leaseback transaction, the newspaper has signed a long-term lease for the 158,300-square-foot former U.S. Southern Command headquarters at Westpointe Business Park in neighboring Doral, Fla. The Herald also found a home for its production activities with the acquisition of an adjacent six-acre site that will soon deliver a 119,000-square-foot industrial facility.

“There were many options that we evaluated, and this particular situation was the closest to meeting all the client’s conditions,” Tere Blanca, president and CEO of Blanca Commercial Real Estate, the firm that represented the Herald in the lease transaction, told Commercial Property Executive.

“There was one important driver for Miami Herald and that was to do everything possible to maintain the office and production facility adjacent to each other, if not in the same building,” Blanca said. “Total occupancy cost of the project and the office space was another significant driver; we had to make sure that their financial objectives were aligned with the most efficient space in the best location.”

Carrying the address of 3511 NW 91st Avenue, the former SouthCom building will be renamed One Herald Plaza at Wespointe Business Park.

The Herald is in good company in Doral, which is one of the fastest growing cities in South Florida. Major businesses such as Univision are located in the city, as are more than a few Fortune 500 companies. “And certainly, it is the heart of international trade in Miami-Dade County and it’s a very progressive city, very business friendly and it offers a lot of amenities,” she noted.

And the area is easily accessible. “Another driver in terms of location is that Doral is a place where you have all the major expressways coming together, so it’s a very good location in terms of logistics and transportation.”

Allied Properties worked with Blanca Commercial on the Herald’s lease agreement, providing strategic counsel on the construction and development facets of the deal, and Fairchild Partners advised on the industrial segment. Commercial real estate services firm CB Richard Ellis represented the owner of Westpointe Business Park, GPA-I L.P., in the transaction.

The newspaper will relocate from its current downtown accommodations and start the presses in Doral in May 2013. When the Herald’s parent organization, the McClatchy Co. sold the Herald’s 750,000-square-foot headquarters building — along with a neighboring 14-acre parcel of land — for $236 million in 2011, as reported by CPE, a deal was made with the buyer for the newspaper to continue to occupy its space free of charge for as long as two years.

The Herald is presently delving into planning its move, and the build out of its future Westpointe home. The company may sublease some of the space once its needs are clearly determined.