Bisnow Reports

With only a few weeks to go until her retirement, CREFC CEO Lisa Pendergast sat down with Bisnow for a wide-ranging interview that spanned fresh data on lender sentiment, where opportunity is today and how CRE has evolved during her decades in the business.

Affinius Capital closed a $3.4B take-private of Veris Residential last month, one of the largest multifamily transactions in years. The deal  represents a change in thesis for Affinius and perhaps for the industry, Affinius partner Ryan Krauch said on this week’s episode of First Draft Live. In the cycle of zero interest rates and constant rate compression, multifamily investment had moved away fr...

The 10-year Treasury rising past 4.5% has taken the wind out of real estate’s recovery sails. Momentum gained in Q1 is already reversing as the war in Iran pushes on inflation. MSCI Chief Economist of Real Estate Research Jim Costello said the volatile bond market is “a new wrench thrown into the works.” And while he believes the CRE recovery is still underway, it’s tenuous. “[Investors] need to d...

Global volatility hasn't pushed commercial real estate investing into a crisis — it's having the opposite effect, Chad Lavender, Newmark's president of capital markets in North America, said on this week's show. Optimism around economic growth is keeping borrowers optimistic that income streams will grow, even if interest rates don't sink. There is no wave of distress on the horizon because debt m...

Only 0.5% of U.S. land works for large-scale data center development. On this episode of First Draft Live, Tract President and Tract Capital managing director Graham Williams, whose firm is behind some of the biggest data center developments in the country, breaks down why power, water, a shrinking skilled workforce and rising regulation and public backlash are making viable sites surprisingly dif...

Multifamily is under pressure from every direction, and yet it is still expected to fix America's housing crisis. A record wave of new supply has hit the market, pushing vacancy higher and rent growth flat or negative in several Sun Belt metros. At the same time, Washington is turning up the heat, with voices like Sen. Elizabeth Warren targeting institutional ownership and the Federal Trade Commis...

This was supposed to be commercial real estate’s year.  The industry entered 2026 expecting interest rates to fall, liquidity to rise, and for long-stalled transactions to finally put the pedal to the metal. For a while, it seemed as though CRE would finally be experiencing a true recovery from the massive hit it took during the pandemic. But today, things are looking a little shakier.  Global ins...

This episode of First Draft Live is presented by Agora . The meteoric rise of artificial intelligence has impacted every industry, including the notoriously tech-adverse commercial real estate world. Scores of new AI-driven tools have left brokers sweating over their commissions and wondering if they will be replaced by software that can automate underwriting and surface buyers instantly. And shar...

This episode is presented by Agora. The federal government is poised to enact legislation to make housing development easier. But federal desire does not always translate to local action — and that is where construction actually happens, said Continental Properties Chairman and CEO James Schloemer, who just concluded a two-year term as chairman of the National Multifamily Housing Council. “There a...

This episode of First Draft Live is presented by Agora . Venezuela, Greenland, Canada’s prime minister calling the death of America as global leader. Interest rate watching, Fed independence under question, tariffs. There’s a lot of noise out there in the macroeconomy that can make it hard for CRE to tune into a good deal. And yet Abbe Franchot Borok, BGO managing director and head of U.S. debt, s...

2025 was a noisy year. Policy changes, interest rate adjustments and geopolitical roller coasters kept CRE on their toes. With financing loosening up and transactions picking up, the groundwork is being laid for a better 2026, but where is a safe investment in a world where fundamentals seem to be shifting? CBRE Global Client Strategist and Senior Economic Advisor Spencer Levy said he advises his...

This holiday season is one filled with contradictions for retail real estate. Consumer confidence has plummeted, but their spending is at all-time highs. Leasing is bustling and vacancy is tight, but store closures are outpacing openings. On this episode, Northwood Retail President Ward Kampf joins the show to unpack the uncertainty surrounding the asset class, which has also been deeply impact by...

2025 has not gone according to plan. Real estate has been bandied about by headwinds of economic, policy and fundamental changes. Interest rate reductions and rising deal flow has the industry feeling better, but stability is a pipe dream these days, especially when federal data is missing and CRE research can conflict. But forget about the data, economist Peter Linneman said on this week’s show —...

While the longest government shutdown in U.S. history may be over, the commercial real estate industry will be feeling its impact for some time. From HUD halting originations and approvals to hotel demand drying up and data going away, the pain has been widespread. And it will continue to impact underwriting and kill deals, especially in the multifamily realm, Origin Investments co-CEO Michael Epi...

The U.S. office market is molting.  The industry has spent the last five years shedding its old skin — and underperforming assets — and is attempting to emerge fresh and appealing to workers. Return-to-office mandates are helping bring workers back to their desks, and vacancy just ticked down for the first time since 2019. But few mandates come with teeth, meaning how many employees actually show...

After years of cautious experimentation, CRE’s biggest players are finally scaling artificial intelligence. JLL has been at the forefront of it, launching an in-house AI platform called Falcon that is cutting deal timelines from weeks to hours and automating the drudgery that once bogged down teams. The result is higher revenue per head, higher success rates when pitching and faster closings. On t...

Live from the CREtech main stage at New York’s Javits Center on October 21, WeWork CEO John Santora sat down with Bisnow Editor-in-Chief Mark Bonner to unpack one of CRE’s biggest comebacks — from bankruptcy to EBITDA positive, $2.2B in revenue and 550K members, including 47 of the Fortune 100. Occupancy has surged past 90% in Midtown Manhattan and hit 100% in key global markets. This conversation...

The optimism that permeated commercial real estate at the start of 2025 has died down as the year has gone on. That's the headline from Deloitte's annual CRE executive survey , but Deloitte partner Sally Ann Flood said on this week's episode that the responses showed an increasingly bifurcated market. Some asset classes, like data centers and warehouses, are "red hot," while investors are still gr...

The AI trade is reshaping markets and CRE is riding shotgun. A surge of capital into chips and data centers has turned AI into the backbone of U.S. growth — pushing tech spending to dot-com-era highs and doubling data center pipelines. But will it pay off? Alarm bells are ringing that adoption may not match optimism. That could quickly mean swathes of massive data centers sitting vacant. Michael P...

The starting gun has gone off: The Federal Reserve lowered interest rates 25 basis points. Now CRE can be off to the races. At least that’s the narrative. In practice, CRE cares more about long-term debt, and the 10-year Treasury ran counter to expectations and actually rose 10 bps, Jim Costello, MSCI’s director of real estate economics , said on this week’s show. Besides, the industry’s problems...

It’s a high-pressure year for multifamily. Looming maturities, tough capital markets, changing policies, a major shake-up of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac on the horizon and intensified national attention are all converging to complicate the sector. But multifamily fundamentals are strong, Sharon Karaffa, president of multifamily debt and structured finance at Newmark, said on this week’s episode. “A...

Global bond markets are under siege and CRE is caught in the crossfire. UK 30-year gilt yields surged to their highest level since 1998, and volatility in U.S. Treasuries has repeatedly brushed them against 5%. For commercial real estate, that means more expensive debt, climbing cap rates and global investors second-guessing allocations. Christopher Stanley, banking industry practice lead at Moody...

This episode of First Draft Live is presented by Agora . The godfather of the CMBS market issued a warning that commercial real estate is not out of the woods of its downturn, which is a potential problem for the U.S. economy.  “The losses in CRE are so big that the rippling effect of those losses to the economy are so big that they could be quite harmful,” Ethan Penner, the founder of Mosaic Real...

This episode of First Draft Live is presented by Agora . It’s been a chaotic year for the construction industry.  Between a volatile tariff regime, elevated interest rates and increased pressures on its labor force, contractors have had to navigate one of the most difficult environments in recent memory.  On this week’s First Draft Live, Shawmut Design and Construction CEO Les Hiscoe breaks down t...

The original Opportunity Zone program drove more than $100B into real estate and business investment, but it also faced criticism it missed its mark, failing to spur development in the areas that needed it most. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act just made OZs permanent and it aims to fix all that, tightening the rules on what areas may be designated OZs, lowering the area median income threshold and...