MCLEAN, VA. — In its 2019 Midyear Outlook, Freddie Mac projects the multifamily rental market to have strong volume growth in the second half of 2019. Combined with a strong labor market and low interest rate, the McLean-based agency believes loan originations will reach $336 billion for the year, which would be an 8 percent increase from the prior year’s total. “A strong labor market and a persistent housing shortage have continued to fuel a robust rental market,” said Steve Guggenmos, who leads Freddie Mac’s multifamily research and modeling team. According to the report, vacancy rates are expected to inch upward as new supply comes on line. The U.S. Census Bureau reports five-plus unit multifamily completions are on pace in 2019 to exceed the previous few years. Freddie Mac’s updated forecast calls for multifamily developers to add up to 365,000 units in 2019, compared with the 345,000 units completed in each of the prior two years. RealPage reports multifamily absorption has averaged about 290,000 units per year over the past three years. Rent growth is also expected to grow approximately 4 percent for the year.
ATLANTA — Mark Hollan, executive vice president, principal and founding partner with the Atlanta office of Lee & Associates, died July 27 due to complications from cancer. Hollan was 61. In his 35-year commercial real estate career, Hollan racked up more than $300 million in transaction history. While at Lee & Associates in Atlanta, Hollan garnered the title of the firm’s top broker 12 times and finished in the top five 25 times. Hollan also earned numerous industry awards including Atlanta Commercial Board of Realtors (ACBR) Top Land Broker and an ACBR Million Dollar Club member (20-plus years). “Mark’s business acumen and work ethic were not only an integral part of the firm’s financial success, but also contributed to the achievements of many younger associates, and to the friendly and supportive culture of our corporate environment,” says Dick Bryant, president and CEO at Lee & Associates’ Atlanta office. “His legacy lives on at Lee & Associates — Atlanta.”
LOUISVILLE, KY. — Pizza Hut will close as many as 500 dine-in stores over the next 24 months as part of a broader strategy to bolster its delivery and carryout services, company executives said during the second-quarter earnings call. Food Business News first reported the announcement. Pizza Hut, which is owned by Louisville, Ky.-based YUM! Brands (NYSE: YUM), operates about 7,500 locations across the United States and 18,000 worldwide. In the United States, roughly 6,100 of the company’s locations are dine-in restaurants. The remaining locations are express units, which feature limited menus and minimal to no in-store seating to prioritize delivery and takeout services. All shuttered stores will be dine-in locations. “We plan to accelerate the transition of our Pizza Hut assets to a more modern delivery carryout and delivery asset base,” YUM! Brands CEO Greg Creed said on the call. “We are excited about collaborating with franchisees who have a growth mindset to accelerate the closure of underperforming dining stores and replacement with new delivery or fast-casual delivery assets.” YUM! Brands owns Pizza Hut and several other restaurant chains, including Kentucky Fried Chicken, Taco Bell and Wingstreet. Pizza Hut express units sometimes share building space with these concepts. All …
IRVINE, CALIF. — Steadfast Apartment REIT (STAR), Steadfast Income REIT (SIR) and Steadfast Apartment REIT III (STAR III) have entered into definitive merger agreements in which STAR will acquire SIR and STAR III in separate stock-for-stock, tax-free transactions. The merger will create a combined company with approximately $3.3 billion in gross real estate assets. The transactions are expected to close in the first quarter of 2020, subject to certain closing conditions, including the approval of the respective mergers by SIR and STAR III stockholders. The merger transactions are expected to close concurrently, but are not conditioned on the consummation of each other. The merger agreements were negotiated on behalf of STAR, SIR and STAR III by their respective special committees, each of which is composed exclusively of independent directors, along with each special committee’s independent financial and legal advisors. “We believe the strategic merger of these three highly complementary portfolios with similar investment strategies will create an enhanced and diversified portfolio, concentrated in high-growth markets,” said Rodney Emery, chairman of STAR, SIR and STAR III. “The enhanced size, scale and prominence of the combined portfolio will greatly improve the company’s access to attractive capital sources, which can be used to …
HOUSTON — Walker & Dunlop, a commercial real estate finance and brokerage firm based in Bethesda, Md., has expanded its platform by adding five debt and equity finance professionals in Houston. Mike Melody, Tom Melody, Tom Fish, Paul House and Jonathan Paine, formerly with JLL, will join Walker & Dunlop and comprise the firm’s first office in Houston, where they will be responsible for securing financing for commercial owners and developers across the Southwestern United States.
NEW YORK CITY — Luxury department store retailer Barneys New York has voluntarily filed for bankruptcy protection and has disclosed plans to close 15 of its 22 brick-and-mortar stores. The Chapter 11 filing in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court of the Southern District of New York indicated that Barneys had more than $100 million in assets and more than $100 million in debts, according to The Wall Street Journal. Barneys plans to keep five of its flagship locations open, including its famous Madison Avenue store. The retailer will also continue operating its downtown Manhattan, Beverly Hills, San Francisco and Boston stores. The company will also keep two Barneys Warehouse locations open in Woodbury, N.Y., and Livermore, Calif., as well as the Barneys.com and BarneysWarehouse.com websites. Barneys will close all other locations, including flagship stores in Chicago, Seattle, Las Vegas, Brooklyn, Philadelphia, Los Angeles and Santa Monica, Calif. This is the second high-end retail concept to file for bankruptcy this week, the other being luxury movie theater company IPIC Entertainment. Veteran retail consultant Jeff Green says that American shoppers are shying away from uber-luxury retailers like Barneys and IPIC, which saw its same-store sales drop 21.7 percent in first-quarter 2019 compared to …
BOCA RATON, FLA. — Luxury movie theater company IPIC Entertainment (Nasdaq: IPIC) has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the United States Bankruptcy Court District of Delaware where it will seek approval of either a sale or financial reorganization plan. In July, the company missed a $10 million interest payment to Retirement System of Alabama (RSA) and notified investors that it might have to file for bankruptcy. IPIC borrowed $204 million from RSA, according to media reports. Hamid Hashemi, founder and CEO of IPIC, says that the company’s movie theaters will remain open and its employees and vendors are being paid. Hashemi notes that issues stemming from IPIC’s expansion plans for building 25 locations in four to five years are the principal culprit behind their missed payment to RSA. “Delays in development cycle combined with the high cost of capital depleted IPIC’s available resources before the company was able to reach critical mass and become self-funded,” says Hashemi. “Importantly, delays related to the Delray Beach location, resulted in unforeseen costs and a significant slowdown in circuit-wide development and new grand openings.” The Boca Raton-based company operates 16 dine-in theaters in nine states with plans to open locations in four more states, including …
PITTSBURGH — The vitamin and health supplement niche of the brick-and-mortar retail market continues to experience intense competitive pressure, observes veteran retail consultant Jeff Green. So it came as no surprise to Green when GNC Holdings Inc. (NYSE: GNC) officials revealed in a second-quarter earnings call earlier this week that it will shutter up to 900 stores in North America by the end of 2020. “It used to be that specialty health supplements were only found in specialty stores such as GNC, Vitamin Shoppe and other regional chains,” says Green, a partner at Phoenix-based Hoffman Strategy Group. “Now you can find the same products sold at traditional supermarkets, specialty food stores and discount department stores.” Citing a decrease in mall traffic over time, Tricia Tolivar, CFO of Pittsburgh-based GNC, said during the earnings call Monday that the company could close up to 500 of its 800 stores that are currently located in malls across the United States and Canada. Ken Martindale, CEO of GNC, added that 28 percent of the company’s stores are situated in malls, while 61 percent are in strip centers. “The negative trends in traffic that we’ve seen in mall stores over the past several years have accelerated …
MIAMI — Tower Commercial Real Estate has launched a full-service cannabis real estate brokerage division in Florida. Tower has closed $50 million worth of cannabis-related retail and industrial transactions in the past 18 moths and has another $15 million of cannabis-related sales expected to close by the end of the year in the state. Senior managing director Scott Allen and senior director Rob Foster of Tower will lead the division. As of May 2, Florida had 213,000 people enrolled in its medical marijuana program with more than 10,000 people signing up each month, making it one of the fastest medical marijuana programs in the country, according to Tower.
IRVING, TEXAS — JPI, an Irving-based multifamily developer with more than 5,000 units under construction, has named former chief development officer Brad Taylor as its new CEO, effective as of July 1. In addition, the company has appointed Chris Clayton, formerly of Forest City Realty Trust, as its new CFO. JPI will also establish a board of directors consisting of Bobby Page, Ron Ingram, Mark Bryant and Kirk Motsenbocker, who previously served as the company’s executive committee. JPI’s adjustments to its leadership structure reflect the company’s effort to focus on optimizing current and future market opportunities.