MetLife Moves to New HQ in NJ

By Keith Loria, Contributing Editor

A joint venture between Vision Real Estate Partners and Rubenstein Partners are developing a 185,000-square-foot, Class A office facility in Hanover, N.J., that will serve as the new global headquarters for MetLife Investments.

“MetLife has been a key corporation in New Jersey and in Morris County, and the global headquarters for MetLife Investments was in the greater Morristown area and this provided a similar location and the site afforded them the opportunity to create a vision going forward on how they want to organize its business,” Sam Morreale, Vision Real Estate Partners’ founder & managing partner, told Commercial Property Executive. “It also offered expansion capabilities and parking requirements they were looking for.”

MetLife Investments’ headquarters will be located on 14 acres fronting Whippany Road, and be part of a larger suburban office campus at 67 Whippany Road’s 100-acre South Campus component, which also houses Bayer Healthcare’s new, 675,000-square-foot East Coast headquarters.

According to Morreale, the new building is being crafted to meet the new generation of workforce standards with a sustainable, world-class, fully amenitized environment for its regional employees.

“They had been in their old headquarters for many years and they wanted a new, state-of-the-art facility, and this was a white palate for them to execute and design exactly what they wanted,” he said. “This is going to be a LEED Gold Core building and a LEED Platinum Interior building, and the layouts are much more accommodating to their business and workforce needs.”

The facility will feature an open-floor plan with collaborative workspaces and breakout rooms, a town hall with technologically advanced conference facilities, a fitness center, employee food court with indoor and outdoor seating, and café. Additionally, it will offer approximately 4.5 parking spaces per 1,000 feet of rentable area, through a combination of surface, structured and under building executive parking.

The building is expected to be ready for occupancy in mid-2016.

The joint venture between Rubenstein Partners and Vision Real Estate Partners will continue to pursue further development of the considerable remaining acreage in the South Campus section. The plan is to create a mixed-use environment, with retail, hospitality, residential and senior living to complement the corporate offices.