GulfShore learns leasing the hard way

One would think a downtown Tampa office market with just under 20% vacancy and fairly economical rents averaging $20 per square foot would be easy pickings for anyone looking to lease space. Joe Caballero will tell you otherwise.

The president and CEO of GulfShore Bank says he spent more than a year scouting suitable space for new headquarters and a ground-level retail branch. The $135 million bank, currently based in the 100 North Tampa office tower, will finally land in 15,000 square feet at 401 S. Florida Ave., in a three-story building that until recently was marked as a redevelopment site.

“It was a nightmare,” Caballero tells Coffee Talk, speaking candidly now that the bank secured a nine-year lease with a February move-in date. The biggest problem, he says, was finding space in a building that wasn't facing foreclosure or already in a distress situation.

Some prospective landlords who were more adept at investing in office buildings rather than leasing them out, wanted to renegotiate terms prior to signing, Caballero says. He sums it up to the conditions of a faulty commercial real estate market, in which solvent building owners appear to be the only ones who can lease space lately.

Caballero says GulfShore's new base, owned by Tampa-based Fuel Investments and Development LLC, will have plenty of space for retail banking, back-office operations and future growth. Of course, he will have to sacrifice his current 19th-floor office view, but “I'm already too busy to look out the window anyway,” he says.