VACASA

Vacasa has risen to the top of the vacation rentals industry, recently surpassing Wyndham Vacation Rentals in the number of properties managed and claiming the number one position in North America. The announcement of a 2018 funding round of $64M brought Vacasa’s total capital raised to $207.5 million, making them the third most funded tech company in Oregon history.

The company offers professional rental management for vacation homes in some of the most desirable vacation destinations in the United States, Europe, South and Central America, and Africa. To keep up with their enormous growth, they needed a new home of their own.

Founded in 2009 in Portland, Vacasa is well acquainted with the distinctive neighborhoods. After making the decision to stay in Portland, they knew right away that they wanted to keep their HQ in the central location of the Pearl District.

In order to find the 100,000 square feet of space in the Pearl that Vacasa needed to accommodate their corporate growth plan, the JLL team needed to think creatively, act quickly, and negotiate wisely.

Vacasa began their search for a new HQ while simultaneously sourcing one of the largest equity raises in Portland history of $103.5M in 2017. Knowing that Vacasa would soon triple in size, the JLL Team set their sights on the new Heartline Building being constructed directly across the street from Vacasa’s current HQ location. Moving into the Heartline Building would allow them to remain in close proximity to their current office, a simple transition for employees.

Only there were two obstacles in their way. The owners of the Heartline Building didn’t want to lease the space to a single tenant and they already had three tenants in line for the space. The owner had essentially pre-leased the building prior to completing construction.

The JLL Team needed to navigate negotiation with precision to position themselves in front of the three tenants already set to occupy the space and keep the transaction together prior to the equity raise. Since the equity raise was confidential, this was a careful line to walk and required exceptional communication and collaboration between JLL and Vacasa.

To quickly underwrite the building, JLL leveraged their knowledge in the Portland market to identify the three tenants in line and triangulated with their timing and credit to put Vacasa in the best position to secure the space.

Moving into the Heartline Building was a defining moment for Vacasa. They not only have a premier building, in a premier location, with their name on top; but they also solidified their HQ in Portland for the long term.

JLL has partnered with Vacasa since 2015 to secure three different leases and built friendships along the way. Vacasa moved into the Heartline Building as a single Tenant in July 2018.