How The Deal To Bring The Dallas Cowboys To Frisco Went Down
FRISCO (CBSDFW.COM) - It's the biggest real estate deal in North Texas this year, if not more.
The Dallas Cowboys have announced they're moving their corporate headquarters and training facility to Frisco as part of a 91 acre entertainment district including restaurants, shops, offices and a luxury resort hotel.
Real estate broker Rex Glendenning, owner of Rex Real Estate in Frisco says, "I believe it's the biggest feather in the cap of Frisco to date."
Glendenning and Matthew Kiran are the guys who helped put that feather in Frisco's cap.
Moving the Dallas Cowboys' corporate headquarters and training facility from Valley Ranch in Irving to this 91 acre site off the Dallas North Tollway and Warren Parkway in Frisco was their idea.
"We said this is where it needs to be in Frisco," said Glendenning.
He says they thought of it after meeting with Cowboys Chief Operating Officer Stephen Jones on a separate deal and then driving past the site on their way back. "I looked at Matthew and said, what the heck are we going to do about it? And he got here the next morning and he went to work, and I went to work."
Boy did they.
That was in late February.
By one week later, the first week of March, they had already developed a conceptual plan after bouncing ideas off each other.
Kiran says, "You know what, what if we created a deal out here that was an entertainment district built around an NFL team? First one ever done."
So in Mid-March, they approached the Frisco Economic Development Corporation.
And in early April, they brought their plan to Stephen Jones and his brother-in-law Joe Hickman.
Kiran says, "Stephen looked at it and said I'm intrigued, continue."
They refined their concept, and in late April or early May, they say they brought the deal to Cowboys owner Jerry Jones.
Glendenning says, "He was not only impressed, he got excited. When he gets excited, and you see that sparkle in his eye, and that charisma he has anyway, you know you have something. But Stephen and Joe did an excellent job vetting it."
He says on June 20th, Jerry Jones gave them the go ahead, and on June 26th, Stephen Jones and Frisco's city manager shook hands on the deal.
This past Monday, it was finalized, when the Frisco Economic Development Corporation, Frisco Community Development Corporation, Frisco City Council, and Frisco ISD Board all approved the deal.
Glendenning and Kiran credit Frisco's leaders. "You rarely see a community come together, work together efficiently to get something turned around in basically 90 days."
Even after their success, Glendenning and Kiran have been working nonstop at their Frisco office -- they haven't even uncorked a single bottle of champagne.
Glendenning says, "I think this weekend we might just catch up with it."
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