WeWork hired JLL and Newmark Knight Frank to help it convince landlords to give it a break on its rent bill, even looking to convert some lease deals into profit-sharing agreements. The Real Deal broke the story, adding to reports by the Wall Street Journal that the troubled co-working giant had stopped paying rent at some of its locations in the United States. But the company was trying to reduce its rent commitments of $47bn even before the emergence of the novel coronavirus. Some may remember that $47bn is also the amount WeWork gave as its value at the beginning of its disastrous IPO last year. The failure to secure new capital has cast grave doubts on its ambitious expansion plans. Most recently WeWork actually filed a suit against its former backer SoftBank for the investment bank’s refusal to carry out a $3bn share buyout as agreed under of a wider bailout package.
