Texas

If you had to sum up the El Paso multifamily market — and to some degree the entire city — in word, it would be “steady.” Though El Paso’s location ensures that impacts of political policies with Mexico can cause immediate disruption in the economy, our commercial real estate markets remain insulated from this activity. Even so, as the city’s jobs and population have grown in tandem with the national economic expansion, El Paso has not yet experienced a true building boom of Class A multifamily product. The city is seeing its renter base become more gentrified, particularly on the west side. In addition, developers in El Paso face the same rising construction costs as builders in other markets. The citywide vacancy rate, which currently stands at about 8 percent, is slowly declining while average asking rents are creeping up. These economic and demographic trends suggest the ceiling for new development of Class A multifamily product in El Paso is quite high. Absorption of new units has remained consistent during this cycle, but as things currently stand, there are only a couple hundred units under construction. Retail Influence Retail frequently follows rooftops, but in El Paso, the two seem to …