CPE’s November 2019 Must-Reads

December 3, 2019

Catch up with our most important stories, interviews and rankings for last month.

This November kicked off with a series of big-dollar transactions from foreign investors as the commercial real estate industry was getting ready for the new EB-5 regulations to go into effect. Singapore’s Ascendas REIT paid $1.2 billion for some 4 million square feet of business park properties, while Spain’s Ponte Gadea acquired a Facebook-leased asset in Seattle for $415 million. Domestic investors also closed multiple significant deals, including Welltower’s purchase of a 1.5 million-square-foot medical office building portfolio, making it the nation’s biggest medical office property owner. In addition, a new Marcus & Millichap research report explained the key factors impacting the medical office sector.

Large-scale development projects were also a notable part of last month’s real estate news. OmniTrax commenced construction of the Savannah Gateway Industrial Hub, a 2,700-acre park in Georgia, Apple broke ground on its $1 billion office campus in Austin, Texas, and the McCarthy HITT joint venture got started on the largest federal investment project in St. Louis’ history.

Additionally, executives in the market looked at how coworking helped reshape the office sector. Yardi Matrix’s Paul Fiorilla detailed how the coworking industry is evolving and what to pay attention to.

Here are CPE’s must-reads for last month:

2019 Top Commercial Owners Spread the Wealth

Find out which firms made CPE’s annual list of the industry’s leading investors.

US CRE Market at Its Peak

The latest research on occupier and investor sentiment in the U.S. indicates steady momentum, with an increasing number of contributors signaling the cycle peak.

Top 5 Office Markets for Vacancy Rate Growth

Metro-level vacancy rates increased by as much as 530 basis points, more than double the national average.

Facebook Leases 1.5 MSF at New York City’s Hudson Yards

The social media firm will start moving into three towers next year, more than doubling its office footprint in Manhattan.

Apple Breaks Ground on $1B Austin Campus

The purveyor of iPhones expects to open the sprawling, 3 million-square-foot office project in 2022.

World’s Highest Retail Rents in 2019

Hong Kong’s Causeway Bay secured a second year at the top of Cushman & Wakefield’s 2019 “Main Streets Across the World” report. The city’s retail market has changed during the third quarter, however.

EB-5 Stakeholders Bank on Future Changes

A program that became a vital source of capital following the last downturn is getting a makeover. We asked Mark Edelstein of Morrison & Foerster to explain the impact of the overhaul on U.S. sponsors.

#MustReads