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Last month, I attended a press briefing given by Prudential Real Estate Investors (PREI), which invests in real estate on behalf of institutional clients. Here is what PREI CEO Allen Smith said. The company has sold more than $1 billion in commercial real estate this year, and Smith said that a lack of liquidity has not been a problem with its buyers. Buyers in these transactions were able to do get financing, if they were willing to pay a price for it. We are talking about commercial real estate in general, and not only about multifamily. One encouraging sign in…

Some time ago I wrote about a new senior housing community that was being proposed in my neighborhood. Since this is a product type that my company also designs, I was quite interested in who was proposing just what, so I followed the process. I can’t recall exactly how it happened, but I ended up on the mailing list of the association that represents my neighborhood, and is called upon to review proposed projects for design consistency. (As a curious aside, when I first moved here about fifteen years ago, I attended a couple of meetings in an attempt to…

Last month, I attended a press briefing given by Prudential Real Estate Investors (PREI), which invests in real estate on behalf of institutional clients.   Here is what PREI CEO Allen Smith said. The company has sold more than $1 billion in commercial real estate this year, and Smith said that a lack of liquidity has not been a problem with its buyers. Buyers in these transactions were able to do get financing, if they were willing to pay a price for it. We are talking about commercial real estate in general, and not only about multifamily. One encouraging sign…

Consider for a moment the above inquiry. It is merely a simple (if not terribly creative) tactical question, designed to engage a prospect in conversation. Think about it for a minute—even if you don’t use the phrase yourself, have you ever seen it fail to evoke the desired response? Me neither. There’s a similar phrase that’s been circulating through the design and building industry for the last few months; it may sound somewhat different, but, in reality, it’s pretty close to prodding about the weather. The question is “Are you staying busy?” What a layered and peculiar question that is!…

Delaware Apartment Association Expands Scope of Services Since the economic crisis began, the apartment industry has looked for a variety of ways to help renters stay in their apartments. But sometimes, despite these efforts, residents do lose their homes. The Delaware Apartment Association wants to help. As Kevin Wolfgang, President of the Delaware Apartment Association, points out, multifamily professionals are on the front lines of this hardship and they witness the devastating impact on families. “Renters want to know where they can turn for information and help. Through our own experiences as apartment operators and our involvement in task forces,”…

Coney Island: Balancing Profit with Personality The Long Island beaches and the Jersey shore are both just a day trip away from my home, but my family sometimes enjoys staying within city limits for our beach outings. We like being able to get on the subway in our neighborhood and be at Rockaway Beach or Coney Island an hour later. Coney Island in particular (my new favorite) possesses a gritty urban vibe that I really like. As Sebastian Smith explains in his travel report at TheAge.com, “The decline of Coney Island began more than half a century ago as urban…

OK, let’s be transparent with one another for a while, shall we? How many of you in the service provider industry know anyone who is still working full time who hasn’t taken a pay/perk/benefit reduction of some kind over the last 18 months? For those of you who haven’t, kudos and congratulations, and may the force be with you. For the rest of us, who, from what I can tell, constitute the vast majority of all professionals, sacrifices have been made in the interest of mutually supporting our peers, or in some instances, even our organizations. Here in California, as…

NAA Exhibitors ScentAir and Beaulieu Demonstrate the Role of Scent Management in the Apartment Business We know that the smell of baking cookies can make a house more attractive to prospective buyers. So why not apply the same principle to rent apartments—or to keep residents from moving elsewhere when their leases are up? There is a growing body of research on the sense of smell to affect consumer responses. According to The Scent Marketing Institute, “scent can be highly effective in helping us distinguish one product from another. It can trigger a memory or desire that influences a purchase decision….