Wells Fargo leases space for mortgage unit in St. Louis Park

 

From the Minneapolis / St. Paul Business Journal: http://www.bizjournals.com/twincities/print-edition/2011/03/18/wells-fargo-leases-more-space-for.html

Wells Fargo leases more space for mortgage unit in SLP

Premium content from Minneapolis / St. Paul Business Journal – by Jim Hammerand, Staff writer

Date: Friday, March 18, 2011, 5:00am CDT

 

Wells Fargo & Co. is transferring about 10 percent of its South Minneapolis home-mortgage campus workforce to a west-metro office complex this spring.

 

Wells Fargo Home Mortgage will move approximately 450 employees from the former Honeywell Inc. headquarters to St. Louis Park, where the lender already rents space for another business line. The division’s highly visible South Minneapolis offices are designed for 4,300 to 4,400 employees and have been “at capacity” for some time, spokeswoman Peggy Gunn said. Heavy snowfall this winter limited parking in the company’s ramps and on local streets.

 

“We just want to be a good neighbor. If there are lots of our team members who are choosing on-street parking, that has an impact,” Gunn said. The move will allow for more efficient and effective use of the South Minneapolis campus, she said. The employees are headed for St. Louis Park’s Metropoint, at 600 Highway 169 S., just north of Interstate 394. The company already has 57,500 square feet rented there for its St. Louis Park-based insurance group, Wells Fargo Insurance Inc. Wells Fargo’s home mortgage unit will lease an additional 76,500 square feet for three years. The employees are scheduled to pack up and head out in late April.

 

Wells Fargo bought the 28-acre South Minneapolis campus for $38 million in 2000 after Honeywell moved its headquarters to New Jersey. Wells Fargo overhauled two buildingsand built a 230,000-square-foot office building for 1,300 workers in 2003, investing a total of $175 million in the property.

 

Totalling 918,500 square feet, Metropoint’s four buildings are owned by Yardley, Pa.- based BPG Properties and managed and leased by New York-based Cushman & Wakefield.

 

San Francisco-based Wells Fargo has approximately 80 national business lines and corporate divisions, and 14 of them are based in the Twin Cities.

 

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