While society is a few years removed from the onset of Covid-19, individuals and businesses across the globe are still dealing with the externalities of the pandemic. Despite its far-reaching and world-halting effect, the COVID-19 pandemic cannot be considered a true black swan event as humanity has dealt with pandemics throughout history. However, similar to black swan events, the sheer scale of the recent pandemic has disproportionately impacted society and will continue to affect humanity for years to come.
Now, in our ‘post-pandemic’ world, the public's priorities and concerns have shifted. Understandably, the national and international consumer base is spending more money on products emphasizing health and wellness. Additionally, the national and international workforce has been increasingly interested in work-life balance and uplifting company culture. As a result of these two trends, many people have either re-located or changed jobs (or both) since the start of the pandemic. To this point, the United States has seen an exodus of residents leaving coastal cities in favor of regions with more space and more favorable business climates. Now, as individuals change their city of residence or place of employment when it no longer serves them, businesses are striving to retain their employees – overhauling company culture or relocating their headquarters to do so.
Jere and Gregg Metcalf are the Atlanta based power couple stepping up to help facilitate companies’ efforts to retain their workforces and prevail through these changing times. As the Executive Vice President, Tenant Representation at Jones Lang LaSalle (JLL), Gregg Metcalf focuses only on office space. As the founder of JMPartners and former luxury broker with Sotheby’s International Realty, Jere Metcalf is deeply connected to residential real estate. Working separately, and always finding synergy in their businesses, the Metcalfs are helping individuals, real estate agents, and companies capitalize on these new market trends without falling prey to the volatility. With proven track records, powerful networks, and irreplaceable professional experience, both Gregg’s and Jere’s individual abilities to empower their clients with the necessary tools, information, and support to thrive in the market is more necessary than ever as businesses and consumers navigate the lasting effects of COVID-19.
As JLL’s Executive Vice President, Tenant Representation, Gregg Metcalf helps corporations and private institutions make strategic, value-added, real estate transactions. While Gregg has experience working on all sides of a real estate transaction from the landlord to the developer to the tenant, Gregg focuses primarily on helping businesses lease office space. As a real estate advisor with over 25 years of experience, overcoming a wide variety of nuanced deals along the way, Gregg has a unique ability to creatively implement leasing and purchasing strategies utilizing national employment data, government incentive packages, and the broad reach of JLL country and worldwide. Whether a business is looking to relocate its office headquarters or expand its satellite offices, Gregg helps his clients implement strategic real estate portfolio plans aimed at mitigating risks, reducing costs, and increasing morale.
Keenly aware of the importance of the economic as well as human aspects of these types of real estate decisions, Gregg is thorough and holistic in his market research and cost analysis of any new real estate market for his clients. Considering the average business cost for the employee, the tax environment, the incentive opportunities, and more, Gregg helps his clients determine what they want out of a real estate transaction and then helps them execute it. Illustrating this visionary foresight and creativity, Gregg was an advocate of office hoteling before COVID-19 made the practice more popular – understanding that many offices were either not optimized or had more office space than was needed. Gregg separates himself from the pack by going beyond his expertise in the economic aspects of workplace strategy, putting just as much emphasis on the human aspect. To this point, Gregg believes one of the most important elements of an office space real estate decision is the company’s ability to use that office space to create a company culture where its employees feel supported and enabled to thrive. This lifelong emphasis is even more critical now in the wake of the COVID-19 Pandemic. Gregg believes that one of the positive externalities of the pandemic is that companies are now forced to invest in their company and office culture to retain employees.
During his time at JLL, Gregg has worked with national and international corporations like Cisco, Prudential, AIG, CohnReznick, Mercedes, and more, leveraging his expertise and network to optimize and manage their office space leases in the U.S. Throughout his career, Gregg has completed over $750 million in real estate transactions on both the landlord and tenant sides, becoming one of the most trusted real estate advisors in the country.
Drawing on her storied career experience as a top luxury real estate broker at Sotheby's International Realty, Jere is now the founder of JMPartners. With JMPartners, Jere has built a thriving community of like-minded real estate agents and entrepreneurs centered around education, growth, and support. As she guides residential real estate in navigating the market and growing their book of business, under the umbrella of JMPartners, Jere created the ’BreakthroughLuxury™️ Coaching’ and Membership. This coaching platform offers luxury real estate agents weekly group coaching calls, weekly, mastermind calls, workshops, 1on1 calls, and a plethora of resources, templates, and tools to help agents grow their businesses. For those looking for a more direct and personal approach, Jere also offers exclusive direct 1on1 coaching and consulting. In addition to the community, courses, and mentorships offered by Jere and JMPartners, Jere is also creatively disseminating her lessons in the popular colloquial podcast style. With her podcast, Top Real Estate Agents Tell How They Do it, also known as, Jere Metcalf Podcast, Jere interviews top luxury real estate agents in the industry, facilitating candid conversations and irreplaceable lessons for the public to listen in on and learn from. Jere’s jump into the world of podcasting does not only illustrate her new media savvy, but it also illustrates her commitment to reaching and helping as many people as possible.
With a long professional history of leveraging her network and market expertise to uplift other agents as well as her community, JMPartners is a natural progression and a perfect fit for Jere. Throughout her career working with many prestigious brokerages and agents, Jere has cultivated a strong network with national and international reach. Facilitating introductions for her old brokerage, Atlanta Fine Homes Sotheby's International Realty, as well as other top industry players like One Sotheby’s, Jere is still extremely tapped into the luxury residential real estate market. During her time as a broker, Jere was known for going the extra mile for her clients, providing world-class service to her clients in what could be the most meaningful financial transaction and personal decision of their lives – buying a home. This is precisely why Jere has always understood the importance of the community and neighborhood a home is located in; as a luxury real estate broker, Jere was not simply selling homes, but selling a lifestyle. Her acute understanding of this nuance allowed her to make meaningful lifelong connections with her clients throughout her career. Similar to how an employee’s experience can be enhanced or diminished by the company and office culture, a homeowner’s standard of living can be enhanced or diminished by the lifestyle the neighborhood can facilitate. Since the COVID-19 exodus from many crowded coastal cities, where many individuals were in dire need of change, Jere’s skill set and attention to detail have been even more valuable when consulting her clients.
As a broker, Jere always focused on the big picture, not just selling houses. In addition to emphasizing broker and agent relationships, Jere has always been committed to helping the city of Atlanta win more business. With a modus operandi of building community, Jere always focused on what she can learn from others and how she could contribute to the end goal. This self-aware and selfless approach has enabled Jere to rise to the top of the Atlanta and United States Luxury Real Estate ecosystems.
Not only are Gregg and Jere known as leaders in their disciplines, but they have both made a name for themselves for their ability to help others. In fact, some of their best business happens when their careers intersect.
For instance, the power couple was integral in Mercedes Benz North America’s relocation from New Jersey to Atlanta, Georgia. Consistent with his comprehensive approach to real estate, Gregg worked with Mercedes Benz analyzing over 78 markets for their relocation options. Implementing his industry-standard approach to analyzing the commercial real estate options, the tax and incentive environments, business logistics, C suite preferences, and employee cost, Gregg helped the Mercedes Benz team narrow their choices down to three cities. While Atlanta was one of the top choices on its own merits, Gregg realized it was the perfect choice from a logistics perspective as Atlanta has the most frequent direct flights to Germany from the U.S., Mercedes already manufactures Sprinter vans 2 hours away in South Carolina, and Mercedes also manufactures their midsize SUV close by in Alabama. However, while Gregg’s detailed analysis helped make the case for Atlanta to be Mercedes Benz North America's new Headquarters, it was Jere’s personal touch that made the decision makers at Mercedes Benz resonate and connect to the city.
As C suite executives are more focused on retaining and recruiting employees, they are increasingly concerned with the cost and effect a relocation decision will have on their employee base. This is in stark contrast to the past when the decision was more executive-centric. Utilizing her real estate expertise and genuine love for the city, Jere brought the Mercedes Benz executives around the city giving them a tour of the various residential markets in Atlanta across different price points, showing the lifestyles each has to offer. This gave the Mercedes team an inside look into where their employees were going to live, where their employees' kids went to school, the quality of life again, and so on. Jere’s market knowledge and emphasis on lifestyle were integral in making the case to the Mercedes executives for Atlanta as the right city for them, their employees, and the business. After the Mercedes team officially decided to relocate to Atlanta, Jere leaned into her relationships and the network of agents she fostered over her career, to introduce the Mercedes executive team to the right brokers in Atlanta for their homes. Consistent with her emphasis on community and desire to put the city first, Jere was the liaison to help these executives get with the right agents to find the right home in Atlanta, despite not taking the business personally.
Beyond the Mercedes deal, when Gregg has a client that is looking to relocate or expand to a new market, Jere will introduce Gregg and his client to a top residential agent that understands the crucial lifestyle component. When applicable, this tag team approach better enables the power couple to extend their reach and help their clients.
As the economy continues to respond to COVID-19 externalities and evolve over time, we are excited to see how Gregg and Jere continue to help their respective clients and find synergy across their businesses.
