Accesso Partners, LLC, a commercial real estate investment management firm that owns and operates 78 office towers nationwide, has moved into its own new boutique headquarters building in Hallandale Beach.
Known as Accesso One, the sleek, contemporary five-story steel and glass midrise at 100 North Federal Highway/US-1, has uninterrupted views of the South Florida skyline.
The firm, launched 15 years ago in a one-room shared office with four desks in Aventura, quickly moved to a rented single-story bungalow-styled startup space at 1140 Hallandale Blvd.
“Even as our employee family grew, we just took more space next door,” says Claudio Dombey, co-founder and managing partner of investor relations. “We were cautious with our capital even though we were bulging at the seams.”
With an office building portfolio of 15 million square feet in major US cities, the firm decided to develop its own building with a distinctive architectural personality and a prime location. “We’re staying local. We’ve grown up in Hallandale Beach. Our employees don’t have to change their commute,” says Dombey.
Yet rather than fully occupy the building, Accesso took the top two floors and is renting the bottom three.
“As landlords,, we’ve learned a few lessons about caring for tenants and managing office buildings,” says Ariel Bentata, co-founder and managing partner of investments. “People are happier and more productive in open, airy, collaborative office spaces instead of cubicles so we have atriums, skylights and floor to ceiling windows.”
Bentata, Dombey and the other founding partners, Moises Benzaquen, who heads finance and Daniel Goldstein, who directs operations, huddled and agreed the rentable floors should offer some of the same options found in skyscrapers in major cities. Among them: two fully-built out “spec suites” for tenants who want to sign a lease and move in instantly. Accesso also gives employees, tenants and free parking, a perk unheard of in most cities.
Renowned Venezuelan architect Celina Bentata designed a rectangular building with an imposing façade on US-1, leaving a portion of the land to the east for parking for tenant, employee and visitor convenience. “The interior structure was designed with only four columns inside the perimeter walls, which results in wide open office spaces,” Bentata explains.
Accesso’s executive offices on the top two floors are located on the outer perimeter of the building while the central space is an open concept with modular desks—all illuminated by energy-saving skylights which provide natural all-day lighting, she says.
Ms. Bentata says Accesso One is an extensively “green” building which decreases the cost of electricity by reducing the need for air conditioning. For example, on the West façade which receives direct heat, especially from the afternoon sun, she designed a four story high metal element with circular perforations. “This significantly reduces solar radiation,” she adds.
With the new headquarters, Accesso saw an opportunity to refresh its brand identity and incorporated the look and feel of the architectural façade in all its visual communications.
Accesso One’s bottom three floors are 54 percent leased, reports Ted Konigsberg, president of Infinity Commercial Real Estate, a South Florida brokerage firm handling the leasing. Imperial Pharmacy has leased a 1,451-square foot retail space on the ground floor. On the second floor, Legal Consulting Group has taken 1,508 square feet and the Dermatology Boutique has leased 1,833 square feet.
“For a move in right away tenant,” he said, two “spec suites” fully built out and furnished offices, 1,557 and 1,620 square feet in size, have been completed on the second floor. The 6,518-square foot third floor is in “warm shell condition and can easily be subdivided,” he added.