Portland’s office market is experiencing strong growth as it continues to benefit from an influx of Bay Area and Seattle tenants moving into the city. This is due to the relatively affordable rental rates and positioning between the two booming tech hubs along the West Coast. The city is seeing an increase of large tech tenants making their home in Portland, starting with Intel, which is Portland’s largest employer. Other companies, such a Genentech, Google, Oracle, Salesforce and many others have also taken up tenancy in the Portland Metro area. Seattle-based Amazon recently leased 83,995 square feet in Portland’s newest Class A office building, Broadway Tower, while Amazon’s AWS Elemental division leased 101,000 square feet in the former Oregonian headquarters, which is adjacent to Broadway Tower. The office market continues to perform well with a vacancy rate of 7.3 percent, beating out the 10-year average of 8.65 percent. All of these new companies making their way to Portland are creating substantial job opportunities for Portland’s ever-growing population. Portland is home to several large industry-leading companies, such as Nike, Intel, Columbia Sportswear and Adidas, which attract workforce talent across the world. This has helped spur the growth of Portland’s economy, which …
The joint effects of heavy supply additions, rising construction costs and the possibility of an looming recession have multifamily lenders in Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW) exercising caution and restraint on new construction financing, even as jobs and people continue to flow into the metroplex and fuel demand for housing. The sector’s fundamentals are very encouraging. According to data from CoStar Group, the metroplex has added approximately 23,000 new units over the past 12 months. At just over 25,000 units, absorption during that period has more than adequate. Vacancy currently sits at 7.5 percent. In addition to the market adding 80,000-plus jobs and 100,000-plus people for several consecutive years, strong demand for Class B properties with value-add potential has kept rent growth moving forward. Concessions have begun to sprout up in a handful of submarkets that have seen particularly concentrated levels of new supply, but the metroplex still posted overall rent growth of 2.9 percent over the last 12 months, according to CoStar. In addition, lenders are keenly aware of the construction industry’s ongoing challenge to add skilled labor. Labor stress is creating longer construction timelines and stabilization periods. “Two years ago, we had subcontractors walking off our job sites because they …
Chicago real estate has been the subject of considerable pessimism from local and national investors due to a variety of factors. Much of this can be blamed on our unfunded pension liability, which is expected to significantly increase real estate taxes across the area in the coming years. Many institutional multifamily investors claim that their data says to avoid Chicago. Instead, they seek multifamily properties at far lower returns and cap rates in places such as Nashville, Austin and Denver. While I believe those cities offer phenomenal investments, investors across the country are missing an amazing opportunity to invest in Chicago apartment properties. Real estate taxes Everyone seems to agree that real estate taxes will rise significantly in Chicago in the coming years. Who pays real estate taxes? Homeowners, commercial landlords and some businesses. Noticeably absent from this list are apartment renters who are generally unaffected by an increase in real estate taxes. In fact, a significant rise in residential real estate taxes should create even more demand for rental apartments in the Chicagoland area as would-be homeowners shift into the rental pool. Effect of high tax rates Do Chicagoans leave the city because of high tax rates? The data …
Strategically located within a day’s drive of 50 percent of the U.S. population, the Richmond metropolitan area has experienced immense growth driven by increased millennial demand, arterial connectivity, a pro-business environment, low cost of living and overall high quality of life, cementing its position as one of the leading Southeastern U.S. markets for employment and capital investment alike. The Richmond market’s strong trajectory is attracting interest from new to the market capital sources, including Brookwood Capital, TPA Group and Ashley Capital, as well as significant corporate investment from the likes of Dominion Energy, Kinsale Insurances and Altria Group. The industrial market in particular has seen robust growth with reported user demand doubling year over year to nearly 6 million square feet as of July 2019 — an all-time high according to Colliers International research. The strength of user demand has resulted in the market’s high bay vacancy rate receding to 5.6 percent and significant speculative and build-to-suit development, including Panattoni’s recently completed Virginia’s I-95 Logistics facility that was 100 percent preleased during construction to Brother International and Amazon. With no shortage of user demand, Richmond’s industrial market is expected to remain a highly desirable market to invest as noted in …
With easy access to the James River, hiking trails and a burgeoning culinary scene, the Richmond region has won numerous accolades for its quality of life. The city remains a top destination for college graduates and young professionals, as well as families and retirees. Apartment demand is fueled by both a growing millennial population and increasing number of empty-nesters who are downsizing. Renters continue to seek accessible apartment communities that are highly walkable with comfortable amenities. As a result, both urban and suburban markets are experiencing an influx of rental demand. The Richmond apartment market continues to experience rising rental rates and interest from out-of-town investors. Apartment rents in Richmond have increased every year since 2012 but remain relatively affordable. The average effective rent reached $1,113 per unit after increasing approximately 3.8 percent over the past 12 months. Accordingly, developers and investors have responded to the steady demand and continue to be bullish on the Richmond market, especially for apartments. There are currently more than 4,000 apartment units under construction, marking a post-recession peak for construction activity. Apartment sales have accounted for more than 50 percent of all commercial real estate transactions during the first half of 2019. Additionally, institutional …
The retail market in Portland remains competitive. Vacancy rates are staying low at 3.1 percent, compared to about 5.5 percent just five years ago, leading to healthy competition among tenants for space. Retailers and brands are thriving across the board in this market. We’re seeing food halls, outdoor apparel, athletic brands, brew pubs, schools, banks, value brands, homegrown food concepts and many franchise concepts entering or expanding. Competitive socializing and esport lounges are growing in popularity across the country, taking up about 32 percent of the leisure tenant market. Competitive socializing concepts like Voicebox and Punchbowl Social are quickly becoming some of the most popular leisure tenants in the Portland area. Live Nation has recently signed a lease for a new entertainment venue at Lloyd Center, which will soon offer more small-venue live entertainment options. Brands like Pendleton, Nike, Columbia Sports, Apple, Nordstrom, H&M and Zara have flagship stores in the downtown core. Patagonia, Anthropologie and a local favorite, the Mercantile, have all expanded their footprints taking prime real estate in the Portland CBD/West End. The desire for wellness and a balanced lifestyle has led to a boom in demand for retail space. Wellness tenants like medical clinics, dental offices …
Throughout the first half of 2018, when oil prices appeared to be on a steady upward trajectory, Midland, Texas, saw a number of energy firms up their stakes in the city’s office market. Major names such as Chevron, Anadarko, Apache and Natural Gas Services Group announced build-to-suit office projects in Midland during this time, adding a significant amount of supply to this 6 million-square-foot market. In addition, strong leasing activity by an array of energy firms looking to bolster their operations in the Permian Basin helped the market’s occupancy rate rise to about 92 percent. This growth in occupancy was anchored by a low unemployment rate and accompanied by positive rent growth. Now, however, with oil prices down from their 2018 highs (West Texas intermediate traded at $56.11 per barrel at the time of this writing), there is more uncertainty in the Midland office market. While the office occupancy rate has held steady and rents have even grown slightly during the last year, currently clocking in at about $23 per square foot, Midland could see a significant amount of supply of office space returned to the market over the next six to 12 months. Examples in Action Chevron, which earlier …
Demand for industrial space is roaring throughout the submarkets surrounding the Port of New York and New Jersey, propelled by the port’s handling of a record amount of cargo thus far in 2019. As a result of the healthy demand, as well as more product coming in and out of the port, landlords are enjoying positive rent growth accentuated by a limited supply of quality industrial space. The port experienced record growth in cargo volume handled during the first six months of 2019, according to internal data from the organization. The number of 20-foot equivalent units (TEUs) handled by the port has already exceeded 3 million for the year and surpassed 611,000 in June alone. This figure represents an all-time record for the port during the first half of the year, enabling it to surpass the Port of Long Beach for the first time in 20 years. Increasing amounts of inventory coming in and out of the port translates to greater demand for industrial space to store, process and ship product. But the port submarket has but a meager supply of real estate to meet the demand. Due to a limited space available for lease, the industrial submarket experienced negative …
The Midland-Odessa retail market continues to get stronger, even with the slight dip in oil prices over the last year. West Texas Intermediate crude oil prices stood at $56.11 per barrel as of August 28, 2019. The economy has remained very strong, with the average unemployment rate in the Midland and Odessa MSAs averaging 2.4 percent in 2018 — essentially full employment. That unemployment rate is also about two percentage points lower than it was in 2012. Housing Drives Retail This strong economic outlook for the Permian Basin oil and gas market is creating major demand for laborers in the area. According to a February 2019 article in the Midland Reporter-Telegram, the size of the Midland-Odessa workforce grew from 173,400 to 180,900 employees between 2017 and 2018. This rapid growth has driven record development in the local housing market. Karr Ingham, an Amarillo economist who prepares the Midland-Odessa Regional Economic Index for the Midland Development Corp., noted that new housing starts set annual records across the board in 2018 — “and it wasn’t even close.” The 1,778 new housing permits in 2018 exceeded 2017’s total of 1,330 by nearly 450 permits, or 33.7 percent. A record 322 permits were issued …
Virginia’s capital city added more jobs in 2018 than in 2017 and 2016 combined. The addition of 11,000 jobs in 12 months aided a 7 percent population growth since 2010 and a median household income increase of $10,000 since 2016. With only 2.9 percent unemployed, residents now have more disposable income to shop. Richmond’s rapid growth brought vacancies to the lowest they’ve been in almost 15 years. At 4.7 percent, vacancy is near the cycle’s lowest trough of 4.5 percent in late 2005. Grocery store competition and limited speculative construction are driving down vacancies. In January, Food & Wine magazine published that Richmond was “Secretly the Supermarket Capital of America.” Publix’s takeover of Martin’s gave the Florida-based grocer a foothold, and new Publix stores are coming by the fourth quarter of 2019 in Westpark Shopping Center, Swift Creek and The Village Shopping Center. Kroger retains the highest market share despite operating only 18 stores compared to Food Lion’s 48. At last count, Aldi stores number 11, The Fresh Market four and Lidl six. With only two stores, however, Wegmans is the per-store average sales leader. Besides grocers, other expanding big box users include Launch Trampoline Park, Burlington, Conn’s HomePlus and …