DM Vantage, Inc.
Commercial Tenant Representation
Every great lease begins with the right view of the table. We represent the tenants who shape San Francisco — corporations, consulates, and the startups. Never the landlord.
Areas of Expertise
A renewal is where a landlord quietly raises the rent — counting on the cost of moving to keep you in place. We make sure you negotiate from knowledge, not inertia: a clear read on the market, then a methodical push for terms that reflect what your tenancy is actually worth.
Where you work is a statement about who you are and where you’re headed. A relocation has to serve the company you are now and the one you intend to become — without overcommitting on cost or term. We find the right space in the right place, then structure the deal so it still fits as you grow.
Early-stage companies change shape fast, and the wrong lease locks you into a footprint you outgrow in a year. We keep you flexible — short-term leases, subleases, swing space — so your real estate keeps pace with your headcount instead of constraining it. Commit to the runway you can see, not the one you’re hoping for.
Growth rarely waits for your lease to end. When you outgrow your space mid-term, expanding in place is often faster, cheaper, and less disruptive than a move — but only if the timing and terms are handled well before you need the room. We map the options early and negotiate the expansion that makes sense, in the building you’re already in.
The Principal
Managing Principal & Founder
BRE # 01230864
For nearly three decades, David R. Mitchell has sat across the table from San Francisco’s landlords on behalf of the tenants who shape the city — Fortune 500 leadership, foreign consulates, and the venture-backed companies. The work is quiet, deliberate, and entirely one-sided: representing the tenant, never the landlord.
He began in San Francisco in 1997 and joined Grubb & Ellis in 2000, where he made commercial tenant representation his entire practice. In 2009 he founded DM Vantage to do that work without compromise — no landlord clients, no divided loyalties. Since then he has structured office transactions across technology, finance, and professional services, for companies based here and abroad, turning each tenant’s business problem into the terms of a lease.
"Patience is leverage."Begin a conversation →