Renters are a pretty curious bunch, and between checking out the latest and greatest buildings and comparing amenities with their friends, they use smart phones and social media to get information. Being in research, an integral part of gaining perspective is to, in essence, act and think like a renter. Emptying my head of such [...]
Have you visited the MHN home page lately? Next time you’re there, we hope you’ll take a minute or two to share your viewpoint by participating in our poll. The topic right now is President Obama’s new mortgage plan allowing more underwater homeowners to restructure their Fannie/Freddie mortgages. We want to know if you think [...]
Apartment rents have been a bright spot in an otherwise dreary economic outlook. The last time I had a conversation with anyone from Greece, he was a taxi driver taking me to LaGuardia. We had a very spirited conversation about Greek politics along with his insistence the speed limit signs in Manhattan were only advisory [...]
People…. Planet…. Profit… Sounds like a recipe for real estate success. In a recent “letter to the editor,” a reader introduced us to Su Casa Properties and its Urban Village concept which looks for synergies between people, planet and profit as it rides an important multifamily trend: creating community among residents.
The Urban Village concept is [...]
Like other abandoned manufacturing facilities, the historic Schmidt Brewery in St. Paul, MN caught the attention of the multifamily sector as a candidate for redevelopment. The 1900 building—which has been described as resembling a castle on Germany’s Rhine River—was designed by Chicago architect Bernard Barthel who incorporated gothic decor and intricate brickwork into its towers, [...]
As you’ll hear again if you read my Editor’s Note in the November issue of MHN (click here to subscribe), I think the USGBC’s GreenBuild conference and expo is an important event to attend. Skip a year every so often, and take turns attending, because new technologies take a while to evolve. But multifamily companies [...]
The president presented his proposals to Congress last evening highlighting both the opportunity to make changes in job growth and the potential derision by the republicans. Despite a lot of wrangling over who is to blame or what sort of spending or stimulus would be effective, the president is offering a plan that is very similar to his previous shovel [...]
There are a number of reasons why I’m neither surprised nor particularly concerned about the jobs report. At the risk of sounding either bullish or bearish, I like to point out to people the rational difference between managing apartments based on news headlines and the long-term trends that matter in multifamily. Frequently I’m called upon to help decipher the [...]
My second job after college was a writing gig in a behemoth building on West 15th Street in the Meatpacking District. Unfortunately this was before the redevelopment wave that later transformed the area into a hipster’s haven. And by the time the Meatpacking District redevelopment started to happen I had moved on to another job [...]
I have to admit, despite years of trying to quit, I am an addict. I have been unable to stop being a Fed Watcher ever since those heady days when Alan “they call me Mr. Glib” Greenspan had the job. Now in the latest development, one participant of a group of three that didn’t want [...]
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