Articles About Industrial

As Chicago’s longest serving mayor leaves his post in May of 2011, Richard M. Daley leaves a legacy that includes the iconic Bean in Millennium Park to the flower-filled planters that ornament 85 miles of the city’s streets.  Whoever fills his post will find that budget shortfalls resulting from the Great Recession will collide with […]

Celebrity architect Helmut Jahn has created a vision for redeveloping Chicago’s Navy Pier, which celebrates its 100th anniversary in 2016.  Writing in the Chicago Tribune about Jahn’s plan, architecture critic Blair Kamin says “Yes, it’s over the top and, in all likelihood, ridiculously expensive.  But it’s full of creative sparks — precisely what was missing […]

Noted Chicago architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe’s famous maxim “Less is more” should apply to ambitious plans for revamping Chicago’s Navy Pier, the city’s top tourist destination.  Writing in the Chicago Tribune, architectural critic Blair Kamin says “The good news about the latest vision for the pier is that it discards the excesses of […]

Real estate professionals who had been expecting a worst-case scenario – an onrush of distressed commercial properties coming onto the market – are still waiting for that to come to fruition.  Ben Johnson, writing in the National Real Estate Investor, notes that “Keep on waiting/lurking seems to be the prevailing view.  According to New York-based […]

Although foreign investment in United States commercial real estate doubled in the 1st half of 2010 compared with 2009, activity is still sluggish, thanks to the slow economy and a lack of trophy properties offered for sale.  Currently, the United Kingdom is the hottest international destination for investment, according to Jones Lang LaSalle research.  So […]

Although construction in the United States has been slow since the financial meltdown of 2008, there is one niche segment that is thriving – green construction.  According to McGraw-Hill Construction, green buildings now comprise one-third of all new construction, an increase of two percent over 2005, a surprise in an industry that is historically slow […]

Yields on United States commercial real estate are nearing record levels compared to Treasury bonds, a sign to investors that the time to buy may have arrived.  Capitalization rates, which measure real estate yields, averaged 7.22 percent in the 2nd quarter, according to the National Council of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries (NCREIF).  That translates to […]

he nation’s financial system needs significantly more regulation than exists now.  The lack of tough regulatory powers strongly impacted the recent financial crash and the Great Recession that ensued.  The good news is that the Obama administration is moving firmly in this direction with financial reform legislation a critical item on its agenda.  This is […]

London remains the most expensive place to park a car, according to the 2010 Global Parking Rate Survey by Colliers International.   The City and West End scored number one and two in terms of monthly parking rates with The City topping out at $933 USD per month (£643), followed by the West End at […]

In Chicago’s – and one of the nation’s — largest commercial transactions of 2010, the 60-story, 1.3 million SF 300 North LaSalle Street skyscraper was sold for a whopping $655 million.  That adds up to $500 PSF. The buyer was KBS Real Estate Investment Trust II (KBS REIT II). The LEED Gold certified building, which […]