Hal Barry, Chairman of Barry Real Estate Companies, brings more than thirty-five years of real estate experience to the company. An intrepid dealmaker, Mr. Barry's career integrates work in all of the industry's disciplines, including financing, brokerage, development, and marketing. Early in his career, Mr. Barry pioneered and negotiated some of Atlanta's most significant deals including the financing for Cumberland Mall, Cumberland Office Park, Peachtree Plaza Hotel, Southlake Mall, Perimeter Center, Atlanta Apparel Mart, and the Atlanta Merchandise Mart. He was also responsible for the land assemblage in downtown Atlanta that brought the headquarters of Georgia Pacific to Atlanta. As a partner with W.B. Johnson Properties, Hal Barry headed the development team for The Monarch Plaza Office Building while also overseeing the management and marketing team for the building. As Chief Executive Officer and President of Portman Barry Investments, Inc., Mr. Barry oversaw the land acquisition, zoning, financing, design, development, management and marketing of two significant mixed use developments in Atlanta: Northpark Town Center and Riverwood. Under Mr. Barry's tutelage, Portman Barry's Investment Brokerage operation became one of the largest in Atlanta.
Since creating Barry Real Estate Companies in 1995, Hal Barry and partner Chris Schoen have been responsible for the development of over 3 million RSF of office space in the southeastern markets. Barry Real Estate has found much success since its inception by creatively meeting the needs of its anchor tenants and offering cost efficient space in exceptional class A office assets. With major tenants including IBM, General Electric Company, Nike, Inc., Ernst & Young, Fortis, Mindspring/Earthlink, The Travelers Insurance Company, Toyota Motor Credit Corporation, Nortel Network, The Hartford, Bradley, Arant, Rose & White, Cingular Wireless, Lafarge North America, and Transamerica, Barry has established a niche in the constantly changing real estate marketplace with its tenant-driven development and service-oriented strategy.
Currently, Barry is underway with perhaps its crowning project to date: "Allen Plaza" named for one of Atlanta's celebrated public servants, Ivan Allen Jr.. Barry signed a lease with Southern Company in January 2004 to anchor 30 Allen Plaza, the new 260,000 SF building under construction along the newly renamed Ivan Allen Jr. Parkway. Barry also signed Ernst & Young in December 2004 to anchor 55 Allen Plaza, a 350,000 SF office tower. Barry is also in the planning stages for a boutique business hotel and condo tower on the same block the Ernst & Young building at 55 Allen Plaza. To establish Allen Plaza as Atlanta's next iconic development, Barry has brought in the world renowned architecture firm Pickard Chilton as design architects for Allen Plaza. It is Barry's strong belief that the timing of Allen Plaza in step with the redevelopment of Ivan Allen Jr. Parkway, the new Georgia Aquarium and the new World of Coke will be defining for downtown Atlanta and the city as a whole.
Mr. Barry's outstanding development experience is reflected in his successful track record of developing, financing, constructing and managing over 5.5 million RSF of Class A office space in his career to date.