ROCKROSE INKS TWO LEASES AT 1150 18TH ST

WASHINGTON, DC-Months after acquiring CBD building 1150 18th St. out of distress, Rockrose Development Corp. has inked two long-term leases to bring up the building’s occupancy. They are with Washington Campus, a university consortium focused on public policy and the Federal Advisory Committee RTCA, for 9,000 square feet and 6,300 square feet, respectively. The building is now 94% occupied. “We’re delighted with the terrific response our property has received from a wide range of prospective space users” Rockrose VP Justin Elghanayan says in a statement, adding that only approximately 10,000 square feet was still available. Rockrose did not return a call to GlobeSt.com in time for publication. When the New York-based company first began negotiating for the building, the occupancy rate was roughly 80%, Elghanayan told GlobeSt.com in an earlier interview. Then, over the course of negotiations, it went up about nine percentage points. One tenant that took on space during that time period was the Embassy of Japan’s cultural center. These deals were anticipated–or at least hoped for–by Rockrose as it calculated the building’s cap rate. Going in it was 5.3% and the firm was targeting at 8.75 cap upon stabilization, Elghanayan said at the time. For the Federal Advisory Committee RTCA, Bill Meyer and Sean Balile of the Meyer Group represented the tenant while Will Stern, Eli Barnes and Richard Tonner of Cassidy Turley represented the owner. Meyer and Balile also represented the Washington Campus, while Mark Richardson and Tom Hilley, of Transwestern, represented the building owner. Craig Deitelzweig, head of Rockrose’s Office Division, represented Rockrose in-house on both leasing transactions.

BY ERIKA MORPHY

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