Top 10 Cities in Emerging Trends in Real Estate® 2017

"This year's report shows that there are opportunities stemming from a shift in how, where, and when people work," says ULI Global Chief Executive Officer Patrick L. Phillips. "One of the trends leading to new opportunities is multi-purposing of commercial space. We're seeing different types of tenants using the same space for different uses at different times of the day, particularly in tight markets. Buildings with open, flexible space have a competitive advantage."  

Top Trends:

• Niche Neighborhoods & Economic Diversity: Market characteristics such as authentic, niche neighborhoods with strong economic diversity are driving growth outside of gateway markets. The attractiveness to both workers and employers alike is supporting real estate growth.
• Labor Shortages: Construction labor shortages are driving up construction costs and stretching out project timelines, directly impacting availability of affordable real estate across all residential sectors.
• "Optionality" - A new driving force landlords can use to protect revenue potential by allowing multiple uses of the same space at different times, and permitting tenants to use only the space they need when they need it.  For example, an office by day and a party/event venue by night.
• Digitization & Transparency: The digitization of real estate is revolutionizing the industry by improving accuracy, transaction speed and transparency, which in turn is fueling an "auto-correcting" real estate cycle.  Rising property prices slowing transaction volumes while new supply remains under control is holding off the traditional "boom/bust" of previous cycles.

Top 10 Cities in Emerging Trends in Real Estate® 2017:

1. Austin, TX
2. Dallas/Fort Worth, TX
3. Portland, OR
4. Seattle, WA
5. Los Angeles, CA
6. Nashville, TN
7. Raleigh/Durham, NC
8. Orange County, CA
9. Charlotte, NC
10. San Francisco, CA

Dropping out of the top 10 market ranking this year are Atlanta, GA and Denver, CO due to concerns that new supply may be getting ahead of demand.  Despite the drop, both markets remain in the top 20.  

Top 5 Markets to Watch and Why:

1. Columbus – A major university town, Columbus is seeing a surge in entrepreneurial activity.  
2. Richmond – The "hip factor" of downtown Richmond is on the rise.  
3. Pittsburgh – Emerging tech and other startups are flocking to Pittsburgh because of the access to talent from nearby universities and a 4% lower-than-the-national-average cost of doing business. 
4. Charleston – The Charleston economy is hitting on all cylinders with strong demographic growth and expanding technology, manufacturing and transportation industries.  
5. Salt Lake City – Salt Lake City is benefiting from a unique synergy between financial services and technology firms.  

Read Full Article HERE

Source: Urban Land Institute

Charleston named nation's top small city once again

• Charleston ranked No. 2 “Hot Real Estate Market to Watch in 2016’
• Charleston No. 1 small city in U.S. to visit, Conde Nast Traveler poll says
• Travel + Leisure names Charleston best city in U.S. and Canada third time in a row

Charleston has been named as the nation’s top small city for the sixth time in a row. Condé Nast Traveler announced its annual Readers’ Choice Awards Tuesday.

“The readers of Condé Nast Traveler are lauded as some of the world’s most discerning, and the hospitality scene in Charleston continues to charm,” Charleston Area Convention and Visitors Bureau President Linn Lesesne said in a statement. “We are thrilled to be recognized once again for our friendly people, historic ambiance and culture, award-winning restaurants, one-of-a-kind shopping and renowned accommodations.”

The median household income of the readers is about $108,000, according to Condé Nast.

Read Full Article HERE

Source: The Post and Courier

Raleigh to be the 3rd fastest growing metro in country over next 25 years

Raleigh leads the mid-Atlantic states in terms of population growth in the next 25 years, according to projections issued Tuesday by American City Business Journals, the parent company of Triangle Business Journal.

The Raleigh metro is expected to have almost 2.2 million residents by 2040, up 72 percent from its current 1.27 million base. That would place the metro as the 35th largest metropolitan area in the country in 25 years. Raleigh currently is the 44th largest metro in the U.S. In raw population terms, the Charlotte metro is expected to grow more by 2040 (by 1.9 million residents) but the percentage growth is only 49 percent — because of its current 2.42 million population base.

Raleigh's meteoric percentage increase in population growth places the metro as the third-fastest growing metro in the next 25 years behind Austin, Texas, and Cape-Coral-Fort Myers, Florida, according to the newly released report.

The Durham-Chapel Hill metro is expected to grow by about 36 percent — from about 552,000 residents to 753,000 by 2040 — making it the 89th largest metro in the country.

ACBJ has generated population projections for 933 metropolitan and micropolitan areas, based on raw data from the U.S. Census Bureau and the University of Virginia's Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service.

Read Full Article HERE

Source: Triangle Business Journal

Nashville Ranked #1 in the Country for White Collar Job Growth since 2010

Forbes discusses Nashville as the top ranked city that appeals to millennials – stating “as companies leave high cost areas like Silicon Valley and San Francisco, they are shifting employment to places like Nashville where their employees can live decently.”

This pattern can be seen in the balance of our top-performing regions. It starts with our top-ranked metro area, Nashville, Tenn., which has seen business service employment grow 47.2% since 2010 to 152,700 jobs, with 7.7% growth last year alone. Some of this comes from the  of Silicon Valley companies like Lyft and Everbright, as well as the expansion of the area’s strong health care and entertainment industries.

Nashville’s appeal to millennials is unsurpassed, with the strongest growth rate in net migration of college-educated people aged 25-34 of any metro area in the country, and the reasons are not hard to find. It’s a charming city located in a temperate part of the country, with both excellent, and affordable, urban and suburban options.

Full Article HERE

Source: Forbes

Tech-Driven Metro Areas Lead 2015 GDP Growth

Tech-Driven Markets Are Driving Economic Growth The ongoing boom in the information technology sector, in areas including social media, cloud computing and cyber security, continues to fuel economic growth across the United States. Technology-driven markets dominate the list of fastest growing economies during 2015, with the San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara metropolitan area topping the list of large economies with real GDP growth of 8.9 percent in 2015 (top chart). Other notable tech hot spots in the top 10 include the Raleigh metro area (up 7.0 percent), Austin (up 5.0 percent), Portland (up 4.6 percent) and San Francisco (up 4.1 percent). In addition, Denver’s GDP rose 4.0 percent in 2015, with contributions from both the tech and energy sectors

Read Full Commentary HERE

Source: U.S. Department of Commerce and Wells Fargo Securities

How The Rest of America Is Competing with Silicon Valley

In today’s economy, it helps to be a city or region that is smart and tech-savvy. And cheap.
A new study by CBRE Research  provides solid evidence that certain places are attracting highly desirable educated young workers, giving these cities an advantage in building a work force that benefits both large tech companies and entrepreneurial startups.

What may be surprising are the places making the top 10 list that lie outside the traditional tech clusters of the west coast and the northeast: places like Baltimore, Dallas, Raleigh-Durham, and Atlanta. According to the researchers, these communities outperform the rest of the country in the percentage of the workforce with a college degree or higher; the concentration of millennials living downtown; the number of top-rated universities; the ability to attract venture capital to startups; and the percentage of jobs in 20 fast-growing tech sectors.

Read full article: HERE
Source: Forbes

3 Reasons Charlotte’s Booming Apartment Market is Just fine, and 1 Note of Caution

It’s the question about Charlotte’s apartment boom that I get most often from readers: “When will the bubble burst?”

That was the title of a forum hosted Thursday by the Greater Charlotte Apartment Association. Jay Parsons, a Dallas-based specialist who tracks apartment data for MPF Research, said that question is being asked in other booming markets throughout the U.S. as well.

“We’re building a lot of apartments across the country, but they remain full,” said Parsons. It’s a cycle – high demand is translating to higher occupancy rates, driving rents higher and spurring more people to develop apartments.

So if you’re waiting for an apartment bubble to burst in Charlotte, don’t hold your breath. Developers and other industry insiders I spoke with are generally optimistic as well, counting on an ongoing influx of millennials and Charlotte’s growing population to fill new units.

Read full article HERE
Source: Charlotte Observer

The 10 Best Cities for Young Entrepreneurs

The 10 Best Cities for Young Entrepreneurs
Credit: RawPixel/Shutterstock

While entrepreneurs can launch new businesses from anywhere, some cities offer a better chance at success. The researchers based their rankings on four key factors:

• Population growth: This indicates more consumer demand and that people are attracted to the area.
• The percentage of young adults earning competitive wages: This demonstrates that there are economic opportunities for younger people and that the community can sustain new products or services.
• The percentage of the population with at least a bachelor’s degree: This indicates that the community has a large population of skilled workers and that the consumer market is sophisticated and affluent.
• Taxes: Lower state taxes offer businesses a better chance at profitability.

Based on the criteria examined, MoneyRates.com named these 10 cities the best for young entrepreneurs in 2016:

1. Austin/Round Rock, Texas: According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Austin/Round Rock is the third-fastest-growing metropolitan area in the nation. Additionally, it is one of the more well-educated areas of the country, with more than one-third of its population having a bachelor degree.
2. Raleigh, North Carolina: The city is one of the 10 fastest-growing in the U.S., and boasts the highest number for the proportion of the population with at least a bachelor’s degree.

Read Full Article HERE
Source: Business News Daily

The Carolina’s Growing Economy Attracts New Development

North Carolina and South Carolina continue to grow solidly. Real GDP growth in the Carolinas grew 2.5 percent in 2015, slightly outpacing the national average (Figure 1). Strong economic growth has encouraged a wave of in-migration, much of which has settled in the Carolinas’ largest metropolitan areas. Charlotte, Raleigh, Greenville, S.C., and Charleston consistently rank among the fastest growing economies in the country and have also been at the top of many popular rankings of best places to live, do business and visit. The burst of economic activity has fueled a development boom, with a surge of new apartment, office, industrial, and retail projects underway throughout the region. Hotel construction is also booming, and single-family homebuilding has finally revived in a meaningful way, particularly in Charlotte and Raleigh, which rank as the nation’s 8th and 15th largest markets, respectively, for single-family housing permits during the first six months of 2016 (Figure 2). Economic growth in the Carolinas is being driven by a combination of recent and long-running trends. Location continues to be a key advantage, with the Carolinas located in the center of the rapidly growing Southeast, which is the fourth-largest economy in the world and home to 82.2 million people. Some of the strongest growth is taking place along the I-85 corridor, the heart of which runs through the Carolinas from Durham down to Greenville, S.C. Growth is also booming along the coast, particularly in the greater Charleston area. North Carolina and South Carolina have consistently ranked among the top states for new and expanding businesses, landing facilities from marquee firms such as BMW, Boeing, Volvo, GE, Sealed Air, and Merck. The influx has further diversified the region’s economic base and pulled in suppliers, related businesses and new residents. Not only have relocations and expansions picked up, but existing industry has also regained its footing, which is good news for the region’s industrial sector.

Read Full Commentary HERE

Source: U.S. Department of Commerce and Wells Fargo Securities

Raleigh is the No. 3 best large U.S. city to live in

Raleigh is the third best large city to live in, according to a report by personal-finance website WalletHub.

The report evaluated the 62 largest United States cities based on 31 metrics, such as health and education system quality, tax burden, and economic growth. Raleigh earned a total score of 69.33, ranking 8th in livability, 8th in education, 15th in health and 2nd in local taxes and economy.

Raleigh is the third best large city to live in, according to personal-finance website… more

San Francisco and Seattle ranked 1st and 2nd on the list, respectively. Charlotte ranked 18th on the list.

Here's how Raleigh ranked in other metrics:

• Best cities to be a driver: 4th
• Best school system quality score: tied 2nd with San Diego, San Jose and Lexington
• Highest household income adjusted by cost of living: 2nd
• Most educated: 6th
• Percent of adults in excellent or very good health: 7th
• Job market: 11th
• Best large cities to start a business: 7th

WalletHub compared the cities with populations of more than 300,000 based on livability, education, health, and local economy and taxes. It evaluated these categories using the metrics, which were graded on a scale from 0 to 100, with 100 representing the most favorable living conditions.

Full Article HERE

Source: TBJ Raleigh/Durham

Raleigh Continues To Be Named As One Of the Top “Big Cities” to Live in US

Everyone has a natural habitat. Some of us prefer the slow pace and bucolic setting of the countryside. Others are drawn to the part-rural, part-urban charm of suburbs. But more and more of us are falling in love with the energetic pulse of the large metropolis.

Big cities are growing nearly twice as fast as they did during the 21st century’s opening decade, according to Census Bureau data, with a variety of factors fueling the trend in favor of more population density. It’s all about the diversity for some, and being in the center of the action for others. Ease of access to food, entertainment and other activities also plays a role. But opportunity, both economic and personal, is the main driving force for most. The tradeoff, of course, is limited square footage. But most city dwellers agree that less wiggle room is a small price to pay for the abundance of available amenities. With real estate and employment markets varying considerably across the country, WalletHub compared the attractiveness of the 62 largest U.S. cities in terms 31 relevant metrics, including measures of livability, health- and education-system quality, economic growth and tax burden. The results, as well as expert commentary and a detailed methodology, can be found below.

Full Article and Rankings: HERE

Source: WalletHub

Chapel Hill group sells new apartments in Fuquay-Varina for $41.5 million

Chapel Hill real estate firm Blue Heron Asset Management has sold for $41.5 million the Village at Marquee Station apartment community that it built in phases in 2013 and 2014 in Fuquay-Varina.

The buyer is a U.S. affiliate of Toronto-based Starlight Investments, which purchased the property free and clear of existing debt, according to a news release about the deal. The 265-unit property sold at a price that averaged around $156,600 per unit.

Read full article: HERE

Source: Triangle Business Journal

Developer plans 330-unit Gateway Germantown apartments

A North Carolina-based commercial real estate firm has paid $5.3 million for 3.26 acres on Rosa L. Parks Boulevard with plans for its first Nashville-area apartments.

Blue Heron Asset Management is partnering with Nashville-based real estate developer Imagine1 Co. on the project that’s tentatively named “Gateway Germantown.”

Plans call for 330 multifamily units plus 5,800 square feet of retail space. The Gateway Germantown building is expected to rise six stories at the corner of Rosa L. Parks and Garfield Street, five stories elsewhere along Rosa L. Parks and three stories farther down Garfield.

Maurice Malfatti, Blue Heron’s managing principal, said the developer had closely monitored Nashville for several years.

“We believe that the region’s economic drivers that have produced job and population growth that is among the top in the nation provides us with a solid foundation for a successful project,” Malfatti said. “We believe that this location, with proximity to the central business district, Germantown restaurants and shops, Interstate 65 and MetroCenter, will offer great access to neighborhood amenities to the future residents of our apartments.”

Read full article: HERE

Source: The Tennessean

Apartment building slated for Germantown-area site

Raleigh-based real estate firm Blue Heron Asset Management and Nashville-based development company Imagine1 Co. announced Tuesday afternoon plans for a mixed-use project to be located on Rosa L. Parks Boulevard in North Nashville’s Historic Buena Vista and near the fast-changing Germantown.

To be called Gateway Germantown and sit on 3.26 acres, the seven-story building will offer 330 apartment units and 5,800 square feet of retail space. The address is 1703 Rosa L. Parks Blvd. (see here courtesy of Google Maps), with Salemtown sitting to the east across the boulevard and Germantown within a few blocks to the southeast.

According to a release, Blue Heron and Imagine1 were to have closed on the acquisition of the property on Tuesday. The team is not disclosing the purchase price.

Gateway Germantown will be Blue Heron’s first Nashville project. the company has developed buildings including apartments, student housing, retail and office space in North Carolina (Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill and Charlotte) and suburban Washington, DC.

Read Full Article: HERE

Source: Nashville Post

Legacy Wealth and Real Estate

The U.S. commercial real estate market is the third largest asset class in America at more than $17 trillion, trailing only U.S. bonds ($40 trillion) and U.S. equities ($30 trillion). As a result, the asset class has become a staple in institutional portfolios, accounting for roughly 8 percent of total holdings. Family offices typically have an even larger allocation, as direct real estate constitutes 12 percent of the average investment portfolio. Yet, the strategies that drive family office investments often diverge from that of larger institutional stakeholders. For instance, family office portfolios…

Read full article: HERE

Source: Institutional Real Estate, Inc