Lendlease Loses Second Executive in San Francisco Office

Talent has walked away from Lendlease’s office in San Francisco, with the second exit of a local executive this year as the firm winds down its Western U.S. operations.

Arden Hearing, who joined the Australia-based developer in 2019 to oversee development across the Western U.S., announced this month he’d quit its office at 111 Sutter Street, the San Francisco Business Times reported. His replacement was not announced by Lendlease.

Hearing will head for Colorado, where he’ll take charge of real estate for Denver-based Alterra Mountain, a hospitality firm that owns ski resorts across North America, including Palisades Tahoe.

His departure follows that of Swathi Bonda, a senior vice president at Lendlease who reported to Hearing and departed over the summer.

Bonda, who joined Lendlease two years ago, oversaw development of Hayes Point, the company’s $1.15 billion project with a 47-story mixed-use tower at 30 Van Ness Avenue. Lendlease shut down construction in August last year, citing poor marketing conditions.

Lendlease said this year it plans to wind down its operations in the Western U.S. as part of a divestment from its U.S. construction business, according to the Business Times.

The firm’s San Francisco office has at least 30 employees, including Claire Johnston, its Americas CEO; Meg Spriggs, managing director of development for the Americas; and Patrick Hanlon, vice president and senior development manager.

Both Johnston and Spriggs had worked with Google on a $15 billion plan to develop four neighborhoods in the South Bay. But in November, Lendlease scuttled the deal.

Signs of a frayed partnership between Google and Lendlease began the previous spring, when they paused development of an 80-acre transit village known as Downtown West, next to Diridon Station in Downtown San Jose.

The decision came as tech companies laid off workers and downsized offices during a shift to remote work. On the residential side, higher interest rates and construction costs hindered homebuilding in Silicon Valley.

The Lendlease project at Hayes Point is on pause until market conditions in the city improve, or until the firm can secure a capital partner or tenant commitment, or both, according to the Business Times.

The developer is now building Habitat, a mixed-use project in Los Angeles that includes 260 luxury apartments and 253,000 square feet of offices. In August, Lendlease and Aware Super scored $316 million in construction financing for the project.

Lendlease may now be poised to downsize offices in San Francisco, where it takes up the 18th floor of the 22-story building at 111 Sutter Street. This summer, JLL began marketing that floor as available for lease, starting in February, according to the Business Times.

“We are currently reviewing tenancy requirements to better suit our ongoing local operations,” PJ Johnston, a spokesman for the company, told the newspaper. “We’re planning to relocate to another office space in San Francisco when our current lease expires next year.”

— Dana Bartholomew