Principles at DLJ Partners are moving ahead at a quick pace on the 40 Warren St. office building, adding a fourth floor and creating high-end office space in a former Urban Renewal building that had worn out its useful life.
With three floors of office space totaling just under 40,000 sq. ft. of office space, and about 3,700 sq. ft. of retail space on the key corner of Warren Avenue, the building is poised to dress up an old corner of the Town when it comes online next year.
Toby Banta, who leads up the New York company’s efforts in Boston, said he is originally from Melrose, and his mother is from Charlestown, and DLJ is very excited to continue working in the Town.
“We’re excited to be in Charlestown,” he said. “It’s our second project here and we don’t think it will be our last. We typically take on projects that aren’t easy – that might be a little hairy. This one was a little hairy, but we’re excited about the prospects.”
The project includes adding a fourth floor to the existing three-story building and re-inventing most of the space for office uses. The fourth floor features floor to ceiling glass all the way around, with excellent views of Warren Street, the Monument and the Navy Yard. Office space on the second and third floors also offer much more natural light and a completely re-built space.
Banta said they are utilizing a broker to market the space and hope to lease up each floor to one tenant each. He said they are marketing to companies in the North Station area that are experiencing rent increases and would like to be close to downtown, but with a significant price decrease. Also, they are marketing to companies outside the city limits who might want to have an office presence in Boston – and the building is perfect for being close to downtown and also transportation networks.
On the ground floor, Banta said they are marketing that as well with Boston Realty Advisors, and they could have one large space or three small spaces. Using input from the community, he said they will choose tenants that are appropriate. He said he expected to be able to announce those tenants next month.
He also said they hope to have leases with office tenants in October, allowing them to build out the interior spaces and get the building fully occupied before next summer.
“I’d like it to be occupied a little earlier than the summer, but we would be happy to have it fully occupied by the summer months next year,” he said.
One key change within the first year of construction has been the intricacies found in the old building.
Banta said they found that the eastern half of the building was not structurally sound, and they had to re-build a significant portion of that side of the building. It was at that point that they decided it would be a much better project if they were to bring in office space to the second floor, nixing a floor of parking. That was approved by the Zoning Board earlier this year.
There are 30 parking spaces and the work is being done by General Contractor Consigli Corp.
As a side note, the fence that has blocked off a portion of Warren Street for a year is slated to come down some time in October, restoring the second lane of traffic and several parking spots.
•In an unrelated project, DLJ Partners recently purchased a construction materials building in the Bunker Hill Industrial Park for several million dollars. Many speculated as to what the company might do with it, but it turns out that it is simply a re-location effort by DLJ related to a Somerville project.
Banta said as part of the project there, they had to relocate a research and development company, and found a great opportunity in the industrial park. He said there is no intention to do anything with the property except to relocate an industrial/lab use there.