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St. Joe adds to bay area property
By KYLE PARKS © St. Petersburg Times, published June 16, 2000 TAMPA -- A year ago, St. Joe Co. didn't own any office space in the Tampa Bay area. That's changing rapidly. The Jacksonville-based real estate company said Thursday it has bought a five-story, 125,000-square-foot office building in Tampa's Hidden River Corporate Park. With this deal, fast-growing St. Joe now owns 562,000 square feet of office space locally. It bought three Clearwater office buildings in January as part of a plan to make the Tampa Bay area one of the company's major markets. St. Joe's aggressive moves are good news for the area's commercial real estate market. Having more deep-pocket bidders for properties means sales prices go up, properties move faster and confident developers build more projects. This market got a similar boost a few years ago when other large out-of-town companies such as Highwoods Properties Inc. and Crescent Resources Inc. moved in. "Having St. Joe arrive in the market just makes it stronger," said John Long of the Grubb & Ellis real estate company's office services group in Tampa. "It helps when there are more people who can afford to buy major properties." St. Joe bought the Hidden River building, called LakeView, from Greenwich, Conn.-based SPP Investment Management. St. Joe would not disclose the price for the building, which is 94 percent leased. Its major tenants are AchieveGlobal Inc., which trains employees for companies, and HQ Global Workplaces, which rents office suites. St. Joe's goal is to have a presence in all corners of the real estate market. Two years ago, it bought the Prudential Florida Realty company in Clearwater. Last year, it bought Tampa-based Florida Real Estate Advisors, a property management company. The management operation, now called Advantis, is adding office brokers, while the commercial division is looking for opportunities to develop office or industrial properties. "There are great opportunities in Tampa Bay," said David Fitch, president of the St. Joe commercial division. "Our focus is on Florida, and in this state you can't help but look at the Tampa area."
 © St. Petersburg Times. All rights reserved. 
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