SYRACUSE — Bell Tenant Champions, a Syracuse–based firm that represents tenants and buyers in real-estate negotiations, has rebranded and changed the way it earns client compensation based on the amount it helps a client save in lease or purchase negotiations. Bell Tenant Champions was formerly known as The Bell Group. It operates on the fourth […]
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SYRACUSE — Bell Tenant Champions, a Syracuse–based firm that represents tenants and buyers in real-estate negotiations, has rebranded and changed the way it earns client compensation based on the amount it helps a client save in lease or purchase negotiations.
Bell Tenant Champions was formerly known as The Bell Group. It operates on the fourth floor of the Bentley Settle Building at 120 Walton St. in Syracuse’s Armory Square.
The firm rebranded during the summer with a name that it believes represents its role in negotiations.
“We believe we’re trying to champion the deal for the client and help them maximize what their real-estate dollar will buy them in the marketplace,” says Mark Bethmann, CEO of Bell Tenant Champions.
At the same time, the company is working under a different compensation model.
Bethmann explained it to the Business Journal News Network in an interview on Oct. 31.
The model
The real-estate tenant representation brokerage model has been “broken or misaligned,” Bethmann contends.
He’s felt that way “for several years.”
In the brokerage industry, a landlord has a listing agent and a tenant has a tenant-representation agent and the two generally split a commission, Bethmann explains.
Under this system, the landlord and his broker are aligned because they’re trying to secure the highest rent or purchase price possible from the buyer or the tenant.
But Bethmann sees a “misalignment” with the tenant representative.
The tenant hires a tenant broker to reduce the cost and negotiate the best deal possible.
“Yet they’re paid a commission, which means the more the tenant pays in rent, or the more they pay on the purchase of a building, the bigger the commission that the landlord broker and the tenant broker split,” says Bethmann.
Bell Tenant Champions believes a tenant-landlord negotiation should involve a “complete separation in commissions.”
The program that Bethmann’s firm has set up involves collecting a commission that’s tied to the tenant’s savings.
“We would be financially compensated based on our ability to help our clients save money, not spend money,” says Bethmann.
He says tenant clients had told him they didn’t see what financial incentive he had to reduce their costs if his commission was tied to the amount they agreed to spend.
Now, Bethmann sees his firm’s new compensation system as in “alignment with our clients.”
The firm’s website refers to it as the “Bell success sharing model.”
The website outlines what it calls the “typical CRE [commercial real estate] model” in which the broker’s compensation, calculated as a percentage of the total deal, is higher if the deal’s dollar value is higher.
In the Bell model, the firm bases its compensation on the “value we create.”
“Quite simply, the more we save you, the more we earn,” the website says.
New York City–based Ayni Brigade, a marketing and advertising services firm, helped Bell develop the new name and worked on its website.
With this new model, Bell Tenant Champions has picked up four new accounts in the last 90 days, Bethmann says. He declined to name them.
Bell Tenant Champions employs nine people, including eight full-time workers. The firm plans to add more employees in 2015, Bethmann says. “We will grow.”
The company operates in a 3,800-square-foot space on the fourth floor of the Bentley Settle Building. Bell Tenant Champions leases its space from Brookline Development.
William Bell founded the firm in 1986 as William T. Bell & Associates. Bethmann acquired the firm in 2001 and renamed it The Bell Group. The founder retired in September 2013.
Contact Reinhardt at ereinhardt@cnybj.com