Uber Deal: A Perfect Puzzle

Turns out Uber's latest downtown lease was perfectly timed to fill a four-floor hole at 685 Market. (And they said all those hours of Tetris would never pay off.) Landlord Brookfield tells us why.

This week Brookfield sealed the 77k SF deal almost a year to the day they bought 685, their most recent foray into the S.F. market. To get some behind-the-scene deal deets, we dialed up Brookfield SVP of office leasing John Barganski, here with Western region analyst Sonia Aulakh-Sims in their LA office. When Macy's vacated 685 this summer to move to 680 Folsom there was time remaining on its lease. Uber first approached Brookfield around the same time termination negotiations were underway with Macy’s. Uber moved quickly and closed the long-term deal in just 45 days. Brookfield had hoped for a "win-win" termination agreement for five floors with Macy's, says John, and thanks to Uber they got one.

Uber's "extremely accelerated" lease at The Monadnock Building matched up perfectly with the agreement with Macy's, he says. Tech companies like Dropbox and Salesforce have also moved at record speed this year to sign on the dotted line. As to whether this will act as "swing space" until Uber occupies their Mission Bay HQ is unclear. (Brookfield doesn't comment on length of leases, so John declined to speculate as to what it represents to Uber.) Uber's been known to be tight-lipped regarding long-term planning, sources say. Brookfield is meeting with the Uber team in the next few days to pinpoint a plan for their move-in in Q4. 

Uber's clearly already busting at the seams six blocks south at its 1455 Market HQ, above. 685's plug-and-play space is already fully built out with a fair amount of furniture. John suspects some modifications, though Uber did see utility in in the improvements Macy's left behind. John says there are a variety of proposals for the remaining quarter of the 205k SF building up for grabs, or 53k SF (which includes one vacated Macy's floor). Hashing out those potential leases has been predicated on finishing up the Uber deal to figure out what else is available. John hints at shopping for more S.F. office product: The market dynamics are great here, he says, and Brookfield continues to look at all opportunities in front of them.