A Richmond Heights office building that had been sitting partly empty since Centene shrank its local footprint in 2022 is now fully leased, after a design-build firm decided to take over the entire property. The expansion turns tens of thousands of square feet of sublease space back into true, in-use offices and delivers a rare dose of positive absorption in the Clayton-area market, which has been flooded with surplus space amid corporate cutbacks and hybrid work.
According to the St. Louis Business Journal, the firm added about 35,000 square feet to its existing 60,000-square-foot lease on Tuesday. That took its total footprint to roughly 95,000 square feet, bringing the building to 100% occupancy and making the company the sole tenant in the property.
The building is Clayton Executive Center I at 7930 Clayton Road, which Centene largely vacated in 2022. ARCO National Construction initially signed on for 60,000 square feet there, leaving the rest of the suites available, as noted by Sansone Group. At the time, leasing agents and the then-owner pointed to flexible floor plates and ample parking as key selling points. With the new expansion, that same tenant now occupies the full structure.
Why This Deal Matters For The Clayton-Richmond Heights Submarket
Filling an entire 95,000-square-foot building lands as welcome news in a submarket that has cycled through hundreds of thousands of square feet of space since Centene started shedding offices. Local reporting has warned that those cuts left the region awash in available inventory, a scenario that made a full-building lease stand out for landlords and brokers alike, according to the St. Louis Argus. One deal will not flip the broader market overnight, but it does immediately put desks, people and paychecks back into a high-profile corridor near Clayton.
Landlord And Tenant Outlook
For the landlord, Stanton Road Capital, shifting the remaining vacant suites into a single-tenant setup is expected to mean steadier rent rolls and lower ongoing leasing costs. On the tenant side, the added square footage offers room to centralize operations and grow services in a well-connected suburban site with surface parking and quick access to Clayton. Brokers say they will be watching to see whether nearby buildings with sizable sublease blocks start to draw fresh interest now that one of the larger chunks of available space in the area has been taken off the table.
