Are you guys for real? The credibility of Jeff Vinik's billion-dollar real estate ambitions
By Ashley Gurbal Kritzer
Tampa Bay Business Journal
Published: Mar 13, 2015

When developer Bob Abberger took the stage at the Tampa Downtown Partnership annual development forum, it was to answer one question: "Are you guys for real?"

As managing director of Strategic Property Partners, Abberger is on the front lines of Tampa Bay Lightning owner Jeff Vinik's billion-dollar development plans. He said after his speech that he isn't surprised to be asked that question routinely.

"We'll continue to get it until we go vertical," said Abberger, who was previously the Florida managing director of Trammell Crow. "I think there's always ultimately a question of whether the market supports the vision, and I lived that real time with Trammell Crow, trying for seven years to do an office development. And I was as close to real as real could be for Tampa, but I never got us there. Mr. Vinik will get us there."

A streetcar to be desired in Tampa Vinik's plans include a new office tower, which downtown Tampa hasn't seen in more than 20 years. Office rents in the urban core have trended upward for several quarters, with the best space and the best views renting for close to $30 per square foot. But that's not enough to make new construction profitable, especially on an urban site - that number would be closer to $40 per square foot.

Abberger has previously said Vinik's team was considering a speculative office development- moving forward before it secures an anchor tenant. A move like that would be next to impossible for a traditional developer, but Vinik, backed by Cascade Investment LLC, isn't dependent on the traditional financing sources that would see a deal like that as too risky.

The tightness of the downtown market is working in Vinik's favor. If a company wants 100,000 square feet of urban office space, it has no choice but to build new.

There's also no threshold of what new space could rent for in downtown Tampa, because it currently doesn't exist. And if Vinik succeeds at luring a corporate headquarters from the Northeast, those executives might not bat an eye at $40 a square foot - for top-tier space in Boston's central business district, for example, office rents are more than $50 per square foot, according to CBRE Group Inc.

There's great interest in the office space, Abberger said, and his charge now is how fast he can move ahead.

"At this point we're still marching to permit, he said. "I have great confidence in our ability to fill that building."

Ashley Gurbal Kritzer is a reporter for the Tampa Bay Business Journal.