Investor Spotlight: The Bromley Companies
January 22, 2020
Since its founding in 1972, The Bromley Companies has built a diversified portfolio of real estate across the country. Their senior management team, with collectively over 120 years’ experience at the firm, have successfully collaborated on a broad range of property investments, development and dispositions. With their sharp focus on developing compelling tenant spaces and highly personalized service, Bromley has developed many loyal relationships with both global Fortune 500 enterprises as well as individual residential tenants. Through the years, their financially conservative investment style has generated consistently superior returns for their financial partners and long-term value to the communities in which they operate.
Nick Haines, CEO
Nicholas Haines is Chief Executive Officer at The Bromley Companies, a national real estate owner and developer focused on mixed use, office, retail and college housing. As CEO he has overseen over $1 billion of development and investment transactions, including the 20 acre, 1.7 million square foot Midtown Tampa development. Nick has led the leasing of over 1 million square feet of office, retail, and residential projects in New York, Florida and Illinois. Nick brought to Bromley previous experience working in business development and marketing as well as investment and served as a founding member of Merrill Lynch’s Principal Investment Group. He received an MBA from Stanford University and a BA from Duke University. Nick is a member of the Board of the Tampa Bay Economic Development Council, the Real Estate Board of New York, and the Executive Committee of the Union Square Partnership.
Your company is based in New York, but you’re investing heavily in the Tampa Bay area with your Midtown Tampa development project. What excites you most about Tampa right now?
We’ve had an office and team members in Tampa for nearly 25 years now. Over that time, we’ve seen firsthand how the City and entire region has developed. There’s been an explosiveness to the energy and growth of Tampa – particularly in the last three or four years – that we believe is accelerating. Tampa has an amazing airport, great neighborhoods with relatively affordable housing, a wonderful climate for active lifestyles, and a range of cultural institutions and leisure activities, including some that were already established in the 1990s, when we first purchased property in Tampa. What’s changing is that these great attributes are increasingly being “discovered.” That is creating incredible net migration to the region and commitments by small and large companies alike togrow their employee base, including growing technology and creative sectors.
Bromley Companies has owned the land Midtown Tampa is being developed on for quite some time. Why did you decide that now is the right time for this project?
As we assembled almost 20 acres at the highest traffic intersection in Tampa (Dale Mabry & I-275), we realized we had a once-in-a-generation opportunity to create a transformative development for Tampa. We felt a responsibility to the City and its residents to come up with a plan that fits the scale and centrality of the site. Over the years, we have probably looked at least 10 different development concepts for our site – from a single user office campus, to a pure play retail center, to a new home for the Rays. While all of these concepts had some merit, there was always something lacking in each plan. However, with Midtown, we have finally arrived at the right combination of a unique and balanced large scale plan than benefits from the urban density of the site with favorable supply and demand dynamics for office, retail, residential and hotel uses at a period in which Tampa (and the general US economy) is undergoing a period of rapid, transformative growth. We feel like the stars finally all aligned for Midtown, and we cannot be more excited to finalize construction and open the project for the Super Bowl in Tampa in February 2021.
When you are travelling or talking to potential tenants and retailers from outside of the market, what do you tell them about the Tampa Bay community?
Culturally and business-wise, Tampa has always been a welcoming place. However, today, given the favorable tax advantages of Florida, coupled with the pro-growth policies of Mayor Castor’s administration, we can’t think of another city in the country in which we would rather be developing a major mixed use project. Tampa’s educationalinstitutions – led by USF – have grown significantly over the past 10-15 years, which is helping to support strong job growth in the area. From a retail standpoint, Tampa has always been a great town for dining out. That’s one of the key reasons we have attracted successful new-to-market concepts, from True Food Kitchen to Shake Shack, to our exciting restaurant lineup at Midtown. We believe that Tampa’s potential is incredible, and its emergence as one of the dynamic cities in the United States is in the very early stages.
The construction for Midtown Tampa is moving along swiftly. What do you think its biggest impact will be for residents once complete?
We envision Midtown as a dynamic, pedestrian-first urban district that is unique for interplay between residential, retail, office and hospitality, and designed around some great public spaces. Whether you live in one of the 390 NOVEL Midtown apartments on site or in the surrounding neighborhood or are shopping or dining at the Midtown retail collection, we believe Midtown will set a new standard not only for Tampa, but as one of the most dynamic mixed use communities in the United States. We plan to operate Midtown as an 18-hour-a-day destination that will be programmed with a wide variety of events and activities. Midtown will be a place that will evolve to fit people’s needs, depending on the time of day and experience they are looking for. For example, the same person might partake in a free outdoor fitness class in the morning on the green at Midtown Commons, enjoy a business lunch at one of our eight centrally located restaurants during the workday, and take a weekend stroll through a farmer’s market, when we close all our internal streets to enhance those pedestrian experiences.
Why is it important for companies to invest in economic development efforts and why is being an Investor in the EDC important to your company?
As big a project as Midtown Tampa is, its success is fundamentally based on the overall vibrancy and continued growth of Tampa. From this perspective, it’s essential to partner with other likeminded developers, community and political leaders and businesses to promote the virtues of doing business and living in Tampa throughout the region, state and nation. We have been members of the EDC for more than 20 years and believe its role as strong advocates for sustainable growth for Tampa has never been more important. Tampa has great opportunities in front of us. We believe that big picture issues such as transportation, affordable housing, and workforce development, can be better addressed when all members of the EDC provide ideas and input to improve the quality of life in Tampa.
