Frisco Station in Texas adds second office building

Dive Brief:

Missouri-based VanTrust Real Estate will start managing construction work this month on the second major office project in the $1.8 billion, 242-acre Frisco Station mixed-use development in Frisco, Texas, according to The Dallas Morning News. Developers have planned a total of five buildings for Frisco Station's office district.
The six-story, 210,000-square-foot Offices Two building will be handled by Manhattan Construction as the design-build contractor, HKS as the project architect and Kimley Horn and Associates as civil engineer.
VanTrust has yet to secure a major tenant for Office Two, but developers are banking on its proximity to the Dallas Cowboys' world headquarters and to entertainment and dining options to draw corporate interest. VanTrust is a partner in the Frisco Station development, along with The Rudman Partnership and Hillwood Properties.

Dive Insight:

VanTrust is also the developer of Frisco Station's first office building, known as Offices One. The HKS-designed, 230,000-square-foot, seven-story building is approximately 45% leased, up from about 26% in May, according to Realty News Report. Tenants include data center company Equinix, which has leased 37,000 square feet, and co-workspace provider Executive Workspace, which has leased 17,000 square feet. VanTrust has also taken up approximately 5,000 square feet to use as its Dallas-area headquarters.

Office construction at Frisco Station, which is expected to add up to 5.5 million square feet, should keep area contractors busy for some time to come, though future projects at the massive mixed-use development might have to stand in line and wait on some of those construction companies to become available. According to a July report from Dodge Data & Analytics, from January 2018 through June 2018, the Dallas-Fort Worth area was second only to New York City in construction starts with a total value of $8.8 billion. This metro placed No. 2 despite a 16% reduction in the pace of construction activity. In comparison, New York City recorded approximately $15 billion in construction starts.

New York City, according to the most recent starts report from Dodge, led the nation in the total volume of office project starts for the first seven months of the year, followed by Washington D.C.; Chicago; Omaha, Nebraska; and Boston. The office building category, however, fell 23% from June, but these figures are often skewed by the start of very large projects, like the $1.8 billion Spire high-rise in New York.