Image courtesy of Margulies Perruzzi
It sounds like a too-good-to-be-true proposition: the opportunity to rent minimal-cost office space in a newly-expanded building steps from the MBTA’s Broadway station.
A Portland, Maine exchange program organizer is marketing 45,000 square feet of new office space to nonprofits at 69 A St. in South Boston. The Council on International Educational Exchange (CIEE) expanded the building next to Amrheins restaurant in 2019, with plans to add a Boston outpost for its growing staff, prior to the pandemic.
After COVID-19 disrupted the group’s study abroad programs, it retrenched and rethought its real estate strategy. CIEE’s 800 employees now work remotely, and the group sold its Portland offices to University of Maine School of Law to stabilize its finances and retire its debt.
“We have this enviable position to not need to do anything with it,” CIEE CEO James Pellow said of the South Boston property. “So we can put it to use for our mission and that’s what we’re trying to do: create a nonprofit hub.”
CIEE bought the A Street property in 2017 for $12 million and spent approximately $27 million on the expansion project, adding two stories of offices built with cross-laminated timber construction.
“We had great visions that this was going to be a 300-person secondary headquarters. We were ready to cut the ribbon in June 2020, but the world fell apart and it didn’t come to fruition,” Pellow said.
A proposed life science conversion was rejected by the Boston Zoning Board of Appeals, so CIEE now is giving nonprofit tenants first chance to lease the office space.
Nonprofits have been squeezed by rising office rents in Greater Boston in recent years. In 2020, the Cambridge Redevelopment Authority acquired 93-99 Bishop Allen Drive in Central Square and designated it as affordable offices for 11 local nonprofits.
Boston Realty Advisors represents CIEE in its leasing negotiations at 69 A St. Pellow said CIEE’s preference is to offer the building at free or low rent for 5 years in exchange for the tenant paying for the interior fitout.
“In a perfect world, we’d fit it up with eight or 10 nonprofits,” he said.
Back-up plans include establishing a training facility for CIEE staff, or offering the space to a community group, Pellow said.
CIEE was founded in New York City in 1947 to foster cultural understanding in the aftermath of World War II. It relocated to Portland in 2008, seeking a lower cost-of-living option for its workforce, which swelled to 1,000 employees, before pursuing the Boston expansion in 2017. The organization also rents 4,000 square feet at 308 Congress St. in Fort Point, which is used for temporary workspace and training.
