Hi,

I want to find out how much it costs to rent out storefront retail
space in the vicinity of mid-town Manhattan and the Financial District
in San Francisco. I'm looking for quotes on street-level spaces only,
and spaces between 5,000-10,000 square feet only.

This should be an easy question to answer, and probably shouldn't
take more than an hour or two to complete. Just call up commerical real
estate agents in both cities and ask them what they've got. I'd do
this myself but I'm out of the country at the moment.

I'm looking for quotes on a total of at least five different retail
spaces in both cities. This means at least ten quotes total. These
quotes should come from at least two different real estate companies
in each city. Three or more companies would be even better.

I need to know: 
* Rental price of the retail space
* Square footage
* Price per square foot, if that's how they calculate the rental cost
* The location of the retail space (address and cross streets -- just
the cross streets is ok if they don't want to reveal the address)
* The name of the real estate agent, the agency, and their phone number

If they tell you anything else about the space or the rental
arrangement, please pass that information along too.

In the event that they ask you for your name and/or the company you
represent, just tell them that you're a third party collecting
information for a client. If they sincerely want to take down your
name and/or phone number then please pass it on to them (it can't
hurt), and if they want to know the name of the company you can tell
them it's Alphamark Consulting.

If you are still out of the country and interested in retail space in
New York and San Francisco, send me an email. I am a retail real
estate broker who has just relocated back to San Francisco after
spending 7 years in New York working on urban retail brokerage. In
order to answer your question we should discuss more specific details.
peter_hancock@cushwake.com