by Bradley Parsons
Staff Writer
Ask property manager Ray Moore where he learned to keep the books for 550 Water Street and he’ll point to his MBA. Ask him where he learned to negotiate leases and he’ll mention 33 years of real estate experience. As for his management style? He gives partial credit to Saddam Hussein.
Moore never sat in on a Hussein leadership seminar, and he’s never chain-whipped an employee. But the retired Navy commander says he learned the value of delegating authority in the mid-1990s while planning to defend Saudi Arabia from the Iraqi dictator.
Moore and a team of eight officers from three different services constantly evaluated 16 different attack scenarios while planning responses for every eventuality. The work drove them 12 hours a day, 7 days a week and Moore says he learned to depend on his employees.
The hours are better now — he estimates he and his management team put in 50-hour weeks overseeing the building — but Moore says his style hasn’t changed. He finds the best people and counts on them. Like military planning, Moore says his team still needs to be ready for any contingency.
“When you manage a building, you’re essentially running a small business,” says Moore. “You oversee construction, negotiate leases, you’re out there marketing, you have to know where your income comes from, how much are your expenses and how to manage to the bottom line.”
Moore says he runs “a tight ship” at 550 Water Street, and he tours the building like a proud captain making the rounds. He points to new generators, new elevators, state-of-the-art communication lines, ticking off their specifications down to the amp and square-foot.
It’s the extra touches, Moore says, that keep his building competitive in a commercial real estate market crowded with downtown supply.
“We want our tenants to know they have our support,” he says. “As long as what they’re asking for is within reason, we’re going to do it for them.”
Moore has worked to build that reputation since he became property manager eight years ago. He said his building is well positioned to add tenants as downtown continues to expand west.
Moving City Hall to the St. James Building began the westward momentum, said Moore, and he expects the relocated Duval County Courthouse to bring law firms calling when it opens in 2007.
Moore said he expects the downtown commercial market to rebound from three consecutive tough years. The flagging stock market of 2001 dragged down office expansion, he said. But Moore said the City has the right mix of public and private leadership to come back.
The commercial sector in Jacksonville benefits from a collaborative spirit that Moore said is unique. He’s managed a high–rise in Houston and bought and sold real estate in Los Angeles, but the Orange Park native said he’s always drawn back to Jacksonville’s cooperative climate.
“People in Jacksonville are different than I’ve met in any other City,” he said. “People are cordial, they want to work together. Here, when a big tenant moves into a building, the property managers don’t gripe about it. They look at it as that much more square footage taken off the market.”