Developer Heady ramps up leasing at Plano tower as work starts on Allen building
Developer Heady ramps up leasing at Plano tower as work starts on Allen building
March 29, 2021 When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, most businesses shopping for North Texas office space punched the pause button.
Developer Randy Heady was building a speculative office project on the Dallas North Tollway in Plano when the pandemic took hold. “We had 1.2 million square feet of real prospects for the building that were ready go,” Heady said. “We were drawing up letters of intent.
“Then COVID hit, and the lights turned out.”
A year later, Heady’s Headquarters II building on the tollway near Legacy West is finally getting some traction.
Heady feels good enough about the office market prospects that he has just started another office in Allen.
“We have about 800,000 square feet of prospects looking at Headquarters II,” Heady said. “Things are really starting to pick up.
“But they are not in the mood to move fast,” he said. “Everyone is still confused about which office workers they bring in and who they leave at home.”
Tenants are also trying to decide what kind of office layout they need for a post-COVID-19 world. “I believe they are going to need more space than they think they do,” Heady said.
Heady ought to know. His Heady Investments has built office projects all over the Dallas-Fort Worth area for more than four decades.
“We’ve done eight buildings on the tollway,” he said. “This is the only spec building fronting on the tollroad in three years in this city.”
With more than 200,000 square feet, the Headquarters II building at Headquarters Drive and the tollway is Heady Investments’ most elaborate project to date.
Designed by O’Brien Architects, the 14-story building includes a 700-space parking garage, a fitness center and a conference center, a lounge and an outdoor patio on the seventh floor.
Heady Investments’ next project in Allen is also starting construction without any tenants locked in.
“This is the only other building that I know of that’s under construction in this area as a speculative building,” Heady said. “We have always been pioneering.”
Called the Allen Tech Hub, the 105,000-square-foot office project is on U.S. Highway 75 near Bethany Drive. It’s in the Watters Creek mixed-use development.
Allen economic development officials hope the project will draw more business to the Collin County community.
“Allen has seen a recent surge in interest from technology companies looking for a home, from fin-tech to video game development to cyber security,” Daniel Bowman, CEO of the Allen Economic Development Corp., said in a statement.
Heady Investment just completed an office in McKinney for a company relocating to Texas from California called KVP International.
“We want to lay out the infrastructure to accommodate not only the amazing organic growth that is occurring right now in Allen but be able to bring in these corporate relocations from California and the East Coast and the West Coast that are looking to expand and also relocate,” Heady Investments’ Sayres Heady said.
The Allen project will be ready for the first tenants late next year.
