By: Marisa Herman Associate Editor
Mark Corlew and Anuj Grover were college roommates at the University of Florida who are now business partners at Grover Corlew, a real estate investment management group.
Their latest local project has been revitalizing Interstate Plaza, an old office building at 1499 West Palmetto Park Road located just off of I -95.
They gave it a new name, Palmetto Place, and a new look, both inside, which is underway, and outside, which is in the works.
Pompano Beach-based Grover Corlew purchased the 87,000-square-foot building in April 2016 off the market for about $9.5 million and plans to invest $6 million in renovating the space.
“We love the location,” Grover said. “Its well positioned right off of Palmetto and has a lot of parking.”
So far, t he building has received a new roof, lighting and elevators. The ground floor has been upgraded with new tile floors and bathrooms and a 2,500-square-foot expansion of office space. The second and fourth floors were under construction last month.
The floors will have communal gathering spaces and they are working on adding amenities like a gym.
The duo said the goal is to have the building fully leased by the end of this year and all of the improvements completed by the fourth quarter of 2019.
The exterior will have an entirely new modern look with updated landscaping.
When Corlew and Grover began working together in 2011, their focus was on multi-family housing. They had a large port folio with properties Nashville, Tampa and Atlanta that they ended up selling when they received an offer they said they couldn’t refuse in 2014.
Then, they began t o pivot their focus to office space in South Florida.
“We built two companies in seven years,” Corlew said. “Our goal is to be in all the major Florida markets.”
Currently, they own properties in Boca, Delray, West Palm Beach, Pompano, Orlando and other places. Their model is i nfi ll investment and redevelopment.
Their goal is to acquire more. To do so, t hey are looking at projects in South Florida, Orlando and Tampa.
“Our company today literally goes back to college,” Grover said. “We would look at nice houses and say we were going to go build it , we just weren’t sure what it was.”
Grover Corlew is considering moving its headquarters from Pompano Beach to Boca Raton.
